A March Back in Time

Meg McCaffrey -- School Library Journal, 7/1/2004

Ku Klux Klan flyers, photographs of the "Little Rock Nine," and first-hand accounts of civil rights activists are featured in an impressive new digital library. The Teachers' Domain Civil Rights Special Collection (www.teachersdomain.org/special/civil) is a free Web site covering a critical period in American history. The site, designed to help students research the topic, includes archival news footage, oral histories, and primary-source documents. Lesson plans are organized by grade level and are aligned with state and nationwide standards.

Boston public television station WGBH created the site with the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute of Alabama, and the libraries of Washington University in St. Louis, MO. The Institute of Museum and Library Services, an independent federal grant-making agency, awarded WGBH a $500,000 grant in 2003 to support the site.

The collection includes information on the Supreme Court's Brown v. Board of Education ruling and episodes of white resistance to integration. Users must register to use the site.