9/11 – Compendium of Resources for Research and Study (2012)
9/11 – Compendium of Resources for Research and Study (2012)
September 11, 2012 marks the eleventh anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks in New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington, DC. Many American museums, archives, and other cultural institutions have amassed extensive collections of artifacts, documents, and educational resources related to research and study of the events surrounding 9/11 and their continuing significance, not only to Americans, but worldwide. What follows is a compendium related to the documentation, interpretation, and memorialization of the event of 9/11.
EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES
National September 11 Memorial & Museum
The National September 11 Memorial & Museum is still under physical construction, but the Museum has created several web resources, including
- interactive timelines
- an artists’ registry for art created in response to the events of 9/11
- lesson plans for teaching children about the historical context of the 9/11 attacks and the post-9/11 world
- webcasts on
Tribute World Trade Center Visitor Center
The educational toolkit, September 11th: Personal Stories of Transformation, provides an introduction to understanding the impact of 9/11 for middle and high school students. The toolkit, available for free online, features 8 interactive video stories of people who were deeply affected by the attacks of 9/11 and who responded with humanitarian initiatives that strengthen their local and global communities.
9/11: The Intelligence Angle (International Spy Museum)
Lesson plans and activities to assist teachers in integrating 9/11 content into their curriculum as well as to explore the following concepts: the balance of national security and civil liberties; the role that intelligence plays in informing policy decisions; and, domestic legislation stemming from national security threats.
Poetry of September 11 (Library of Congress)
Guide to poetry written in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.
PRIMARY SOURCES
The September 11 Digital Archive (American Social History Project at City University of New York Graduate Center and the Center for History and New Media at George Mason University)
The September 11 Digital Archive uses electronic media to collect, preserve, and present the history of September 11, 2001 and its aftermath. The Archive contains more than 150,000 digital items, a tally that includes more than 40,000 emails and other electronic communications, more than 40,000 first-hand stories, and more than 15,000 digital images.
First-person oral histories about September 11.
September 11 Web Archive (Library of Congress)
The September 11, 2001, Web Archive preserves the web expressions of individuals, groups, the press and institutions in the United States and from around the world in the aftermath of the attacks in the United States on September 11, 2001. The selected web sites are comprised broadly of United States and non-United States government sites; press, corporate/business, portal, charity/civic, advocacy/interest, religious, school/educational, individual/volunteer, professional organizations sites; and other sites.
Understanding 9/11: A Television News Archive (Internet Archive)
3,000 hours of international TV News from 20 channels over 7 days and select analysis by scholars.
Witness and Response: September 11 Acquisitions at the Library of Congress (Library of Congress)
Exhibition based on the abundance of original material including prints, photographs, drawings, poems, eye-witness accounts and personal reactions, headlines, books, magazines, songs, maps, videotapes, films, and even physical remnants collected by the Library of Congress to document the events of 9/11.
9/11 Collection (Smithsonian Institution)
Online exhibition of more than 50 objects recovered from the three sites attacked on 9/11—New York, the Pentagon, and Shanksville, Pennsylvania—as well as acquisitions that relate to how American lives have changed since September 11.
September 11 Oral Histories (The New York Times)
City records from 9/11, including more than 12,000 pages of oral histories rendered in the voices of 503 firefighters, paramedics, and emergency medical technicians, published by The New York Times.
The September 11th Sourcebooks (National Security Archive, George Washington University)
Archive of declassified U.S. documents related to September 11 with academic analysis.
Compilation of 9/11 Official Statements and Documents (Yale Law School)
9/11 Commission Report (9/11 Commission)
9/11 Commission Records (U.S. National Archives and Records Administration)
When the 9/11 Commission closed on August 21, 2004, it transferred legal custody of its records to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). The Commission encouraged the release of its records to the fullest extent possible in January 2009. The collection online represents approximately 35% of the Commission's archived textual records, which are currently publicly available; NARA is continuing to process these documents.
