By the way, cool archive, Steve!

IMHO, if you're just browsing, you're best starting off with the ones from the 1840s and 50s. (The 1830s ones are a bit TOO early to be rich with material. And by the 60s, the songs have been around the bend and back again a few times.)

My favorite ones, not on this list, are the 1840s collections _The Negro Singer's Own Book_ and _Nigga Songs_. I'm not finding them perusable online, however. (I recall checking one out of a library's Special Collections once, and the young attendant gave me some pretty strange looks!) At least one of them (can't remember which... they must be deeply buried in my PAPER files) is presented less as a collection of minstrel artists' stage material and more like a resource of "collected" material from Black singers. Sort of like a raw archive of songs that White minstrel performers might draw on to create stage versions.