History Research

Data & Genealogy

Scholarly resources in all areas of historical research at Boston College

Page under Construction

This page is currently under construction and far from complete. If you notice broken links or have suggestions, please write the subject librarian an e-mail.

More Data Resources

The databases listed here are just the beginning of our statistical and spatial data collections. See the Data/Statistics/GIS Portal for a more complete list.

Digital Scholarship

The term 'digital humanities' implies the application of new technology to various humanities disciplines, especially to aid in new directions of research or to add new speed, accuracy, or collaboration not otherwise possible.

It can include analysis across a large corpus of text, application of geographic information systems to a set of data, visualization techniques to illustrate material in a new way, or many other possible tools and practices.

The Libraries' Digital Scholarship group is tasked with exploring and supporting this work at Boston College.

Data Database Recommendations

Our World in Data
A database of data databases. Global coverage as available. Temporal coverage depends on topic, which include population, health, energy, environment, growth and inequality, education, politics.

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Created by Max Roser, economist, Oxford University and staff.

Genealogy

Ancestry Library Edition
With 7 billion genealogical records from across the globe and millions of family trees, this is the world’s largest online family history resource.

Data and Statistics for the US

American FactFinder
Population, housing, and income data from the U.S. Census Bureau.
Historical Census Browser
Visualized data drawn from the U.S. Census, 1790–1960.

Historical Statistics of the United States
The authoritative numerical history of the United States.

ICPSR
Use search terms indicating education level of study such as elementary, high school, secondary education, adult education, colleges etc. Narrow search by using additional search terms such as: trends, curriculum, academic achievement, testing, environment, parental influence

Economic Data: Currency and Exchange

Handbook of World Exchange Rates, 1590-1914 by Markus A. Denzel
Publication Date: 2010

As a world economy emerged from the 16th-17th centuries onwards, a global cashless payment system arose. This had its base in Europe, first in Italy, then in the rising regions of the north-west, with Amsterdam and then London as the central financial market.

Maddison Project
Continuing the work of Angus Maddison, offers estimates of world economic growth (GDP per capita) 1995-2014 CE.
Total Economy Database
GDP, population, employment, productivity, and more for 123 countries from 1950–present. Formerly from the Groningen Growth and Development Centre, and now maintained by the Conference Board.

Social History

Data-Planet Statistical Datasets
Time series data from licensed and public domain datasets including key government data. Areas covered include: economic indicators, banking, crime, employment, environment, health, housing, industry, pricing and cost of living, transportation data and many more topics. Incudes International Monetary Fund Data. Download data in spreadsheet format with some shapefiles for Geographic Information Systems..

Gapminder
Select world data from WHO, UN, World Bank, International Agency for Research on Cancer and others. Offers interactive visualizations.

Immigrations, Migrations and Refugees: Global Perspectives, 1941-1996
From the archives of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency come government reports covering all aspects of global migration during much of the 20th-century, including such pivotal events as post-World War II Jewish resettlement, South African apartheid, Latin American migrations to the United States and much more. This digital archive captures translated and English-language radio and television broadcasts, newspapers, periodicals and government documents, along with analysis by the CIA predecessor agency.
International Historical Statistics
Statistical data from around the world (Americas, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Oceania) covering a wide range of socio-economic topics. This resource updates the latest print edition (2007) of International Historical Statistics. It includes 260 years of data, collected between 1750-2010, and offers the ability to compare by year or geographic region and to download data as an ePDF or Excel file.

International historical statistics, 1750-2010 by B. R Mitchell
ISBN: 9781137305688
Publication Date: 2013

Updated to 2010 wherever possible, it provides key economic and social indicators for the last 260 years, serving as an essential reference source."

International Institute of Social History: Data Sets
Includes access to multiple data sets from different spaces around the globe, predominately focused on the 19th and 20th centuries, some older. Emphasizes social history with information on labor, wages, prices and more.

OECD Statistics
The OECD Statistics delivers a selection of the most frequently used OECD statistics. These monthly, quarterly or annual time series cover the OECD's main areas of coverage: Agriculture and Food - Development and Aid - General Economic Problems - Economic Indicators - National Accounts - Employment - Energy - Financial and Fiscal Affairs - Industry, Science and Technology - Foreign Trade.
Social Explorer
Provide quick and easy access to historical census data and demographic information. Creates maps and reports to help users visually analyze and understand demography and social change throughout history. Includes the U.S. Census from 1790–2000 and all annual updates from the American Community Survey.

Economic History: Commodities and Trade

Economic History (EH) Association: Databasess
Mostly historical US datasets, some. European, including "U.S. Customs House Data, 1854-59" and "Cole monthly commodity prices, 1700-1861" and others.
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
Publications on the availability of food products from the 1950s to the present.
USDA: Foreign Agricultural Service
United States Department of Agriculture provides recent data sets on agricultural production and food around the world.
World Inequality Database
Database of the world's historical and current distribution of wealth and incomes within and between countries. Data included comes from national accounts, survey data, fiscal data, wealth rankings. Temporal coverage depends on topic, some sets beginning in the 1950s others in the 1990s.

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Coordinated by an executive committee of five co-directors from the Paris School of Economics and University of California Berkeley, with assistance from World Inequality Lab.

For additional help

For additional recommendations, contact your subject liaison (Dr. Bee Lehman) at brittany.lehman@bc.edu or schedule an appointment with them.

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