ANCHOR, or A North Carolina History Online Resource, is a web collection maintained by the State Library of North Carolina’s Government and Heritage Library (GHL). ANCHOR is an organized, chronologically-ordered resource that presents North Carolina’s history from pre-colonization to the present. It focuses on notable events, places, and people that have helped shape the state’s history. It may also contain entries that discuss world history and how North Carolina intersected those events. As the scope is broad, ANCHOR entries can be biographical, topical, or a combination of the two. ANCHOR is designed primarily for school-aged learners (around grade 8), and the language and content in draft articles for the resource should reflect that audience. 

Bibliographic and subject elements:  Title, Author

Example: 

Old Field Schools of Sleepy Hollow
By Rip Van Winkle

Introductory Paragraph:  
The introductory paragraph should summarize the topic, its significance to history, and ties to themes in North Carolina. In addition, the first sentence of an ANCHOR entry should try to entice the learning audience. This can be a thought-provoking question, fun fact, or other snippet of information that draws learners into the following content. 

Example:

Body Text:
An ANCHOR entry should remain neutral in tone, avoiding polarizing or subjective language. The article should provide a chronological overview of important aspects of the topic, giving special attention to events occurring in, or of importance to, North Carolina. Specific geographic locations, like cities and towns, of merit should be discussed. Biographical subjects should have been born in, have strong ties to, or have lived a significant portion of their life in North Carolina. Discrepancies between sources and interpretations should be noted. 

ANCHOR strives to engage with its readership freely. This means that ANCHOR entries are allowed to pose questions, offer ideas, invoke themes or imagery, relate to the reader, or otherwise help foster learning and engagement. This can involve the use of exclamatory phrases (!) or other engaging language to help invest learners. Some examples are included below.

Examples:

Style Guide for ANCHOR Entry Body Text

1. ANCHOR entries should range between 500 to 1000 words. More complex topics may warrant additional entries (Ex. Part 1, Part 2, etc.)
   a.    Disabled Veterans of the Civil War
   b.    Japanese-American Imprisonment 
2. ANCHOR entries should be clear and concise: Avoid run-on sentences; avoid sentences with more than one idea. Try to separate sentences into smaller phrases that express individual ideas. Avoid using figures of speech or colloquial expressions. 
3. ANCHOR submissions should follow the latest edition of the Chicago Manual of Style (CMoS). This style guide discusses language choices and citations. Citations for ANCHOR pages should be compiled and included in Chicago style. 
   1. Information about the Chicago Manual of Style is available from the CMoS website, as well as the Purdue University Writing Lab. 
4. Entries must include a list of authoritative references. The number of desired references is contingent upon the niche, depth, and scope of the submitted entry.
   1. Authoritative references include government publications, academic (peer-reviewed) journals, books written by subject matter experts, and publications from universities. Other authoritative references can include websites that include references or footnotes to support their claims, and primary sources which directly inform the mentioned subject.
      1. References should be easily traceable and findable so GHL staff can adequately fact check. We encourage using authoritative databases, books from our collections, and primary sources from the State Archives of NC/the North Carolina Digital Collections to ensure we can readily access the references. 
5. Primary source information and references are desired. 
   1. What are primary sources? Primary sources are historical objects, government publications, letters, newspapers, journals, ephemera, or other resource that provides a direct link to the subject being discussed. 
      1. Example: When discussing the implications of the sit-ins during the Civil Rights Movement, one could include a reference to a newspaper clipping from February 1960 that discussed public reactions to sit-in protesters.
      2. Example: When establishing a subject’s cause of death that is not known, one could include a reference to the subject’s government-issued death certificate that enumerates their death and its causes.
6. Quotations from primary source materials are encouraged. These can help enhance the body text and allow the reader to directly relate to the subject matter. 

Supplemental Resources:

ANCHOR pages also rely on supplemental materials. These include post-reading questions, a glossary, and Chicago-style references. Some other supplemental resources that can be integrated into the ANCHOR article webpage include Educator Resources, notable People, or Related Topics. Each supplemental resource and its guidelines are explained below:

1. Some topics introduce new words and ideas that readers may not be familiar with. In these scenarios, it helps to have a referable, compiled glossary defining words with which the reader may not be familiar.
2. ANCHOR web pages help the reader by supplementing text passages with other information like media, other text resources, and possible educator resources. Please include any such resources at the time of your submission if they are discovered during the research process. 

Examples:

Sample ANCHOR Entries:

1. The My Lai Massacre - March 16, 1968
2. Disabled Veterans of the Civil War
3. The Women of Bennett College: Unsung Heroes of the Civil Rights Movement
4. Juneteenth
5. Thomas Peters, Black Loyalist and Founding Father of Sierra Leone
6. Important Revolutionary War Sites: Quaker Meadows, N.C.