Q. I want to find books on American history from 1400 to 1860, but I don't have a subject yet. I really just want to look on the shelves.

You do have to have a subject in order to search for books, but if you want to browse shelves for books before you decide on a specific subject, you can use the Library of Congress Classification Outline to see where you should be browsing.

1. Go to the Library of Congress Classification Oultine on the Find Books on Shelves page of the How to Find Books guide.
2. For American History 1400 to 1860, click on E -- HISTORY OF THE AMERICAS (PDF file).
3. From there you can see that Colonial History starts in the E 186's, so you can start browsing there.

You can also try looking out our American History guide (link below) to find great books by time period.