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May 1, 2009

Newspaper Archive - Not to be Missed!

I have just discovered Newspaper Archive. And I love it! Why did it take me so long to find this site? I played around in it almost all day yesterday, found quite a bit of information on my Michigan ancestors and happily saved and took snapshots of the newspaper articles for my family tree.

They have quite a long list of newspapers scanned and fully searchable, and more are being added. The little blurb at the top of the home page reads

Easily Find Over 3.39 Billion Names • Over 1.13 Billion Articles • 826 Cities • 241 Years • 3,426 Titles

The site is easy to use and very nicely laid out. The search engine functions well and you can choose basic (first and last name) or advanced (exact phrases, keywords, exact year or a range of years, location and more)

When you get results you see a bit of text relevant to your search terms, then you click to view the newspaper page which loads in .pdf format. It is easy to find what you want within the page by clicking on the binoculars icon at the top! That brings up a search screen which searches within the .pdf image. Very cool.

You can zoom in or out. You can save your .pdf file to your computer (the full newspaper page) or you can use the little camera icon to take a snapshot. This allows you to outline the article you want, and it automatically copies it as a graphic to your clipboard. Simply open your favourite graphic program (I use IRFANVIEW) and paste the graphic, then save it to your computer. I really like this option.

You can even browse the list of available newspapers by title or by location. I noted several countries besides America. I plan to go back and have an in-depth look to see what's available for Canada. I saw it listed but didn't have time to explore. I'm eager to get back, and yes, I'm officially a fan of NewspaperArchive.com

1 comment:

Annette Fulford said...

Hi Lorine,

One Canadian newspaper that is part of NewspaperArchive is the Lethbridge Herald. It is free to search at http://lethbridgeherald.newspaperarchive.com/Default.aspx