Document Bank of VA
Document Bank of Virginia (DBVa) is the Library of Virginia’s initiative to get documents into classrooms. Using primary sources, teachers can make history relevant to students while helping them learn and understand state standards. DBVa will teach students to be critical thinkers as they analyze the original documents and draw their own conclusions about Virginia’s past.
Explora Public Libraries
- EBSCO’s Explora is a user-friendly search tool that supports both research and instruction. Explora searches across the following resources.
- MasterFILE Complete – A comprehensive collection of full-text general interest articles from periodicals, newspapers, and books. This authoritative general information database is the best place to start your research project.
- Read It! – Research while practicing reading skills. Read It! helps students who have a basic foundation in English grammar and reading but need level-appropriate reading material. Read It! is also a great tool for English Language Learners.
Explora Secondary Schools
Explora supports both student research and classroom instruction with age-appropriate content for middle and high school learners with an easy-to-use interface and great accessibility tools, including translation and text to sound.
Gale in Context: Elementary
Gale In Context: Elementary meets the research needs of students in Kindergarten through grade 5, with age-appropriate content from magazines, newspapers, and reference materials, covering current events, the arts, science, health, people, government, history, and more.
Genealogy Research
Explore your roots with our genealogy research resources
Legal Forms
Find downloadable, fillable forms for basic legal transactions, current to Virginia code covering basic legal needs--wills, power of attorney, landlord/tenant, and lots more. Includes a comprehensive section of templates for small businesses including: invoices, leases, sales agreements, contracts, and more.
Local Historical Newspapers Digital Archive
Browse or search our Essex Historical Newspapers archive. Titles include the Tidewater Democrat and the Rappahannock Times. Look for this newspaper collection to grow over time.