Search Tips
To enter a query, type in a few descriptive words and click the Search button for a list of relevant web pages. Since searches only return web pages that contain all the words in your query, refining or narrowing your search is as simple as adding more words to the search terms you have already entered. Your new query will return a smaller subset of the pages found for your original "too-broad" query.
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Choosing Keywords
For best results, it's important to choose your keywords wisely. Keep these tips in mind:
Try the obvious first. If you're looking for information on Shakespeare, enter Shakespeare rather than playwrights.
Use words likely to appear on a page with the information you want. "Luxury hotel dubuque" gets better results than "really nice places to spend the night in Dubuque".
Make keywords as specific as possible. "Antique lead soldiers" gets more relevant results than "old metal toys".
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Automatic "and" Queries
By default, search only returns pages that include all of your search terms. There is no need to include "and" between terms. Keep in mind that the order in which the terms are typed will affect the search results. To restrict a search further, just include more terms. For example, to find events for donors, simply type:
donor event
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Automatic Exclusion of Common Words
Searches ignore common words and characters such as "where" and "how", as well as certain single digits and single letters, because they tend to slow down your search without improving the results. The search results will indicate if a common word has been excluded by displaying details on the results page below the search box.
If a common word is essential to getting the results you want, you can include it by putting a "+" sign in front of it. (Be sure to include a space before the "+" sign.)
Another method for doing this is conducting a phrase search, which means putting quotation marks around two or more words. Common words in a phrase search (e.g., "where are you") are included in the search.
For example, to search for Richard III, use:
Richard +III
~ OR ~
"Richard III"
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Capitalization
Google searches are NOT case sensitive. All letters, regardless of how you type them, will be understood as lower case. For example, searches for "william shakespeare", "William Shakespeare", and "wIlLiAm ShAkEsPeArE" will all return the same results.
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Word Variations (Stemming)
To provide the most accurate results, our search does not use "stemming" or support "wildcard" searches. In other words, Google searches for exactly the words that you enter in the search box. Searching for "nun" or "nun*" will not yield "nuns" or "nunnery". If in doubt, try both forms: "knave" and "knaves," for instance.
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