Although this is not what I do, I’ll share my suggested approach for amateur and hobbyist historians who are 1) short on time 2) not in possession of encyclopedic archival knowledge but 3) nonetheless interested in formulating a balanced historiography.

There is an historian somewhere who has written about your topic. I guarantee it. 1910s cotton mills in Spartanburg South Carolina? David Carlton, Professor Emeritus at Vanderbilt University has a great book called Mill and Town. The history of time zones? Vanessa Ogle, Harvard University: The Global Transformation of Time. 15th century French cuisine and home economics? The late great Fernand Braudel has three thick volumes and heaven knows how many monographs. In short, ANY topic of importance should have at least one seminal researcher who has written a monograph or book.

They’ve done a lot of your work for you. Find that book, order it on Amazon or pick it up at your local library, and read it. Then go to their bibliography and note all the cited primary and secondary material. Pick up the secondary material and rinse and repeat. Note which sources the first author disagreed with and pay special attention to them, because you want to form a balanced opinion not just regurgitate the expert’s. Nonetheless, any serious academic historian should have encyclopedic knowledge of the notable works in their specific subspecialty, so use that!