In putting together a logically concentrated group of materials you should be able in a few years to begin to have a very special collection that will be worth much more as a group than what you paid for the individual pieces. You’ll also, in short order, become the expert in your area of interest. For many of you there should be a book to write both to document your experiences and to share what you have learned.
Now here then are some random searches of our Database. These are just to give you some idea of what you can find today. Every week we add about 6,000 additional records so the number of matches is always increasing. Your imagination is your only limit.
| Name | Records | Name | Records | |
| baseball | 62 | Pequod | 13 | |
| Brooklyn | 728 | Pequot | 69 | |
| candles | 27 | pirate | 216 | |
| circus | 65 | plague | 101 | |
| court martial | 376 | poison | 69 | |
| dueling | 11 | privateer | 85 | |
| hanging | 154 | Pueblo | 413 | |
| musket | 33 | soap | 34 | |
| Narragansett | 99 | South Dakota | 119 | |
| North Dakota | 85 | steam boat | 91 |
This entire AE project has grown out of my experience with the net and both its opportunities and limitations. Clearly the net is ripe for the development of databases that are the missing link to huge masses of information that daily increase in volume and complexity. Today you can find millions of items but unless you have the knowledge of an expert you will be easily confused by the many alternatives that are not independently explained. For the Americana field we seek to provide a huge and neutral database that simply masses the accumulated facts of the field into what will ultimately be more than a million records. Interested parties can then search these records in ways that personally appeal to them. Some of these database searchers will become the builders of very specific and targeted collections. It is possible as never before.
