History: Canada: Reference

Materials which are referred to for brief or general information. Examples include:

• Background or overview synopses (encyclopedia)
• Definitions (dictionary)
• Synonyms (thesaurus)
• Statistics
• Biographical Details
• Maps (atlas)

Reference resources are organized in an order that aids searching (alphabetically, chronologically, etc).  Most include an index which points users to the appropriate section.  Tips for searching:

1. Decide on your search terms
2. Try searching with them
3. If not satisfied with the results, try searching a synonym or related idea

Things to watch out for:

• Is the computer searching only the title/header of the entries or the full-text of the information?  You will get more results, but more of them will be irrelabent if you are searching the full-text.
• Are you searching for a proper noun (name, place,...)?  Make sure that the spelling is correct and try variations if it originated in a foreign language.
• Searching for something by date?  This is trickier than it sounds.  If possible, search for an event name or topic rather than a date, e.g. civil rights movement or hippies or flower children rather than 1960s.

The Oxford companion to Canadian history. Ref. F1026 .O93 2004
The Encyclopedia of colonial and revolutionary America. Ref. E188 .E63 1990
The Canadian encyclopedia. Ref. F1006 .C36 1985

Historical Statistics of Canada 1965 (Ref HA 746.U7)
International historical statistics : the Americas 1750-1988. Ref. HA175 .M52 1993

Historical atlas of Canada. Ref G 1116.S1 H58 1987
Atlas historique du Canada Français, des origines à 1867. Ref G 1116.S1 T7 1961