Virtual Reference Desk

Recommend a Website

How we select an External Website

General Reference

Acronym Finder

This web site contains common acronyms and abbreviations about all subjects, with a focus on computers, technology, telecommunications, and the military.

World Fact Book

Information on the nations of the world, gathered and published by the CIA. Includes an overview of government, geography, people, communication, transportation, military and transnational issues.

Biography.Com

Biography.com is a searchable database of over 20,000 personalities. This site is good for locating brief biographical sketches of prominent people, both historical and contemporary.

Nobel Prizes

This is the official website of the Nobel Foundation. You can find history of the prizes, who has won them, what the different prizes are, and more.

Publist: The International Directory of Publications

PubList is a searchable database of over 150,000 magazines, journals, newsletters, & other periodicals. This is an excellent source for verifying publication information.

MapQuest

"MapQuest.com's award-winning web site helps millions of Web visitors get to where they need to be each day. By simply typing in an origin and destination, or even just a city and state, visitors can get driving directions, create customized maps, view nearby businesses and points of interest, and plan a trip with Mobil Travel's rated lodging, restaurant and city information."

USPS Zip Code Directory

"The ZIP Code Look-Up and City/State/ZIP Code Association are free services provided by the USPS to assist the public with their addressing needs."

Statistical Resources on the Web

This site provides a large collection of many different types of statistics that are available on the Web. Created by the University of Michigan Documents Center, it uses a frame with subject links down the left side of the page for navigation and also allows you to browse by major subject areas on the main page. It also gives a search option.

Kentucky Online Newspapers

The Advocate-Messenger

Danville's online daily newspaper provides free access to headline news, sports and entertainment. In addition, The Advocate-Messenger provides access to agricultural links, an "Area Guide," and "History." For cover-to-cover coverage, click on Subscribe to the Advocate Messenger link.

Appalachian News-Weekly

Pikeville's online multi-weekly newspaper provides free access to the front page, editorials, obituaries, and sports. To subscribe to the online version of this newspaper, click on the subscribe link at the bottom of the page.

Business First of Louisville

The online weekly business newspaper of greater Louisville. "The stories from the print edition are posted to the web on Monday mornings. Only a limited number of articles are posted to the web. Certain features from the paper, such as the complete Top 25 List, record materials and special publications, are not available on the web." This site allows searching of its archive back to 1996.

CKNJ Online

Campbellsville's online newspaper provides free access to the headline news, sports, classifieds, and opinions.

The Courier-Journal

In addition to providing free access to the top stories covering local, national, and business news, Louisville's online daily newspaper also provides access to "The Louisville Scene." "The Louisville Scene" is Louisville's "guide to movies, music, nightspots, restaurants and the arts." The archives are not available on the Internet.

Cumberland County News

Cumberland County News is a weekly online newspaper. It provides free access to the lead stories. In addition, it provides access to approximately a year's archive of articles. To subscribe, click on "Subscription Forum."

The Daily Independent

Ashland's daily online newspaper provides free access to top stories in news, business and sports. For subscription information, click on "Contact Us."

The Floyd County Times

The Floyd County Times is published every Sunday, Wednesday and Friday in Prestonsburg, Ky. It has free access to local news, lifestyles, sports and classifieds. To subscribe, click on "Subscriptions."

Georgetown News-Graphic

Georgetown's tri-weekly online newspaper provides free access to the headline news, sports, business, and classifieds. In addition, the Georgetown News-Graphic contains a searchable archive that dates back to 1998. To subscribe, click on "Subscription Information."

Glasgow Daily Times

Glasgows daily online newspaper provides free access to the featured news stories in local news, sports, and business. For subscription information, click on "About" and call the newspaper.

The Gleaner

Henderson's daily online newspaper provides free access to the past 2 months' top news stories, sports and columns. To subscribe to this newspaper, clink on "Subscribe."

Grant County Online

Williamstown's online newspaper provides free access to the headline news. For subscription information, click on "Subscribe."

Kentucky New Era

Hopkinsville's daily online newspaper provides free access to the lead stories, sports, and classifieds. In addition, this site includes a searchable archive that dates back to Aug. 1, 1999. For subscription information, click on the "Subscribe" link.

The Kentucky Post

Covingtons's daily online newspaper provides free access to today's headline news, sports, business news, sports. In addition, The Kentucky Post, contains an archive back to 1997 and provides links to the AP wire and to The Cincinnati Post. For subscription information, click on "subscribe."

The Kentucky Standard

Bardstown's weekly online newspaper provides free access to front page news, key sport stories, and community calendar. For subscription information, click on subscribe to the Kentucky Standard.

The Ledger-Independent

Maysville's daily online newspaper allows free viewing of top news stories, editorials, sport, and classifieds. To subscribe, click on the "Subscribe Now!" button.

The Lexington Herald-Leader

This is Lexington's daily online newspaper. At this site you have free access to selected top news, sport, business, and "Nation & World" stories. To subscribe, click on "Newspaper Subscriptions."

The Messenger

Madisonvilles's newspaper online allows free access to the front page and allows archival browsing of the past seven days. In addition to the front page access, The Messenger provides free access to a "Photo Gallery", "Teen Talk", and the "AP Wire." For subscription information, click on the "Circulation" button.

Messenger-Inquirer

Owensboro's online paper provides access to the full paper including classifieds, features, opinions, sports and more.

Murray Ledger & Times

Murray's newspaper online newspaper provides free viewing of the current weeks top stories in news and sports. In addition, the obituaries and classifieds are available for viewing. For subscription information, click on the "Circulation" button.

The News Enterprise

The News Enterprise is Elizabethtown's online daily newspaper. It provides access to top news stories, The Wire (Associated Press News), classifieds, and information on Hardin County schools.

News-Democrat & Leader

The News-Democrat & Leader, is Russellville's weekly newspaper. Access is provided to top stories, farm news, sports, and a business directory. In addition, the News-Democrat & Leader has an email news service available for free.

The News Journal

The News Journal provides local news access for Williamsburg, Corbin, and London. In addition, there is a link to AP news. To subscribe, click on "Subscription Info."

The Oldham Era

Oldham County newspaper provides access to news briefs, sports, local school information, classifieds.

The Paducah Sun

Paducah's daily newspaper allows free access to front page news, classifieds, and the weather. To access the full newspaper, contact the Paducah Sun by clicking on the "Subscriptions" button.

The Paintsville Herald

Paintsville's weekly newspaper provides free access to front page news, sports, lifestyle, and classifieds. To subscribe, click on "How to subscribe to the Paintsville Herald Plus."

Sentinel-News

Shelbyville's weekly newspaper provides free access to headline news, top sport stories, and local community and school information. For subscription information, call 502/633-2526.

The Times Leader

Princeton's bi-weekly newspaper is published every Wednesday and Saturday. The Times Leader does not provide free access. To subscribe, email the paper at [email protected].

Union County Advocate

Morganfield's weekly newspaper provides free access to local news and sports. Local news includes agriculture, Business, and government news.

The Winchester Sun

Winchester's daily newspaper provides free access to front page local news, sports, and the classifieds. For subscriptions information, click on the "Mail us" link.

Internet Subject Guides

Internet Public Library (IPL)

IPL is an annotated collection of reference sources available on the Internet. Organized by subject, it is a good place to look for websites.

Librarians Index to the Internet

"The Librarians' Index to the Internet is a searchable, annotated subject directory of more than 5,700 Internet resources selected and evaluated by librarians for their usefulness to users of public libraries. It's meant to be used by both librarians and non-librarians as a reliable and efficient guide to described and evaluated Internet resources." It's one of the best subject guides out there.

WWW Virtual Library

The WWW Virtual Library is one of the oldest subject oriented catalogs of Web sites available. It is known for its access to quality sites.

Almanacs

Information Please Almanac

This excellent reference source allows users to search for facts relating to countries of the world, sports, health and science. The online version of Information Please Almanac, also includes access to Random House Collegiate Dictionary and Columbia Encyclopedia.

Farmer's Almanac

This interesting web site provides information on astronomical events, weather conditions, recipes, and gardening.

Dictionaries

Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary & Thesaurus

This is the dictionary of choice. Its features include cross referencing, biographical and geographical names, and names of plants and animals.

Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Encyclopedias

Encyclopedia.com

This encyclopedia contains more than 14,000 articles from The Concise Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Third Edition. This is a great place to find background information or a general overview of any given topic.

Encyclopaedia Britannica

EB Online includes the complete encyclopedia, as well as Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary and the Britannica Book of the Year. You can also use EB Online to search an Internet directory that includes more than 130,000 links to Web sites selected, rated, and reviewed by Britannica editors.

Telephone Directories

Switchboard

This site will help you identify phone numbers, Email and addresses of people and businesses in the US.

Telephone Directories on the Web

This website provides access to phone books all over the world. Choose the country you are interested in and choose from many white and yellow pages.

Reverse Phone Directory

The Reverse Phone Directory allows users to identify names and addresses from phone numbers. This site also provides access to Infospace-"The Ultimate Directory" and AnyWho-a searchable electronic of AT&T's directory. A first-rate site to find directory information on the Internet.

On-Line Books Page

"The On-line Books Page is a directory of books that can be freely read right on the Internet. It includes an index of thousand of on-line books on the Internet, pointers to significant directories and archives of on-line texts, and special exhibits."

Alex Catalogue of Electronic Texts

"The Alex Catalogue of Electronic Texts is a collection of digital documents. The scope of documents in the collection include items from American literature, English literature, and Western philosophy."

Bartleby.Com

"Bartleby.com combines the best of both contemporary and classic reference works, making it the most comprehensive public reference library ever published on the web." This site provides access to such works as Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, the Columbia Encyclopedia, and the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language.

Project Gutenberg

Project Gutenberg was one of the first Internet sites that provided access to fulltext of public domain materials. At this site, you will "find the classic books from the start of this century and previous centuries, from authors like Shakespeare, Poe, Dante, as well as well-loved favorites like the Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the Tarzan and Mars books of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland as told by Lewis Carroll, and thousands of others."

Electronic Text Center - UVA

"The Electronic Text Center's holdings include approximately 45,000 on- and off-line humanities texts in twelve languages, with more than 50,000 related images (book illustrations, covers, manuscripts, newspaper pages, page images of Special Collections books, museum objects, etc.)" Most of the Electronic Center's collection is accessed via the library catalog.

Humanities Text Initiative (HTI)

Supported by the University of Michigan Press, the School of Information, and the University Library, HTI provides access to reference and humanities resources online. This site contains a text and an image collection.