Use the Library Catalog to browse or search for books and more in the holdings of the VSC libraries.
Or try an Advanced Search: put “United States history” or "Vermont history" as a subject, and put in some keywords from your topic.
For browsing purposes,
the call number for
Vermont history is
973.4
If you're interested in an item in the catalog that is at another Vermont State College library, you can request to have it sent to Castleton for you.
Click on the title of the item, then "Place Request" and sign in
It takes about a week if it's available. You'll get an email in your Castleton email when it arrives.
Searching by keyword (called "All Fields" in new online catalog)
Choose the most significant concepts for your search. Put "and" between them. Click on Find button or hit enter.
For example:
Put your subject term in the basic search box, and select Subject from the drop-down menu.
For example:
Or, try an Advanced Search.
For example:
Then, put in your topic as a subject. Add a keyword for a more focused search.
Click on a title to learn more about the item and where it's located.
To find more items catalogued under the same subject heading, while you're looking at the full catalog record for the item, look at the subject headings and click on the desired one:
To place an interlibrary loan request for a book or audiovisual item found at another college in the Vermont State Colleges Online Catalog:
You'll receive the book in approximately one week if it's available. You'll get a message in your CU email when it arrives.
Worldcat is a very large union catalog that includes the holdings of most U.S. academic libraries.
Google Books permits searching the full content of some books. Books in the public domain (not copyright protected) are available online.
If you find a book (or other item) of interest that the VSC libraries don't own, you can request it through interlibrary loan.
Within the library catalog, click on Search Other Libraries
Find the book you want and click on 
Then log in and make the request. Pay attention to your Castleton email for follow-up.
(personal narrative* or corresponden* or diar* or interview* or oral or eyewitness or letter* or document*)
and civil war and Vermont
(The asterisk substitutes for whatever letters that might come next, so that the search includes any words that start with what's typed but might end differently. For example, diar* catches diary and diaries and diarist. Different databases use different symbols for this.)
In the library's catalog, it might look like this:
Notice the parentheses around the or phrase and the truncation
child* and (television or TV or television viewing) and violen*