Historical Data Source

Hat tip: MR

[A] new database, on-line, it looks very useful and it is constructed by smart people.  Summary:

Welcome to Historical Financial Statistics, a free, noncommercial data set that went online in July 2010. We aim to be a source of comprehensive, authoritative, easy-to-use macroeconomic data stretching back several centuries. Our target range of coverage is from 1492 to the present, with special emphasis on the years before 1950, which few databases cover in detail.