American Memory is a digital record of American history and creativity. These materials, from the collections of the Library of Congress and other institutions, chronicle historical events, people, places, and ideas that continue to shape America, serving the public as a resource for education and lifelong learning. You can select collections by time period and then search by your topic. Be aware that your results will contain items that match any of the words in your search term (which means you'll get some crazy-wrong hits)!

A huge archive of images, most of which they try to sell you. Includes many, many public domain images. Select "editorial" content (news items) or "archives" to search.

Wikimedia Commons is a repository of free images, sound and other multimedia files.

Although Creative Commons is not a search engine, it offers convenient access to search services provided by other independent organizations. Search Google Images, Flickr, and more for content that you can modify, adapt, or build upon.