Historical newspapers are essential to our cultural heritage, encapsulating the social, economic, and political nuances of different time periods. As we advance in the digital age, many newspapers have been digitized and made available to communities for free online via search platforms like the Community History Archives. This transformation provides a window to our past […]
Planning To Digitize? Use A “3 Legged Stool”
Planning To Digitize? Use A “3 Legged Stool” When evaluating how to approach making your microfilm or other historical printed content available digitally, plan for the best balance of quality and quantity that allows you to maximize the available funds, We all know that preserving our cultural heritage often falls to local communities and groups, […]
Historical Newspaper Research
There is a lot to learn from old newspapers if you know what you are looking for. Before the advent of the Internet, it was newspapers that were relied on most for information. Now, many old newspapers have been digitized and made available online as a resource for historians, genealogists and writers among others. With […]
Making Old Newspapers Searchable: Microfilm & OCR
The Paper Problem: With the newfound ability to assemble content and produce pages quickly and efficiently, existing papers increased their circulation numbers substantially. The demand for the paper on which to print the news inevitably grew as well. This created a need to use a less expensive paper stock to match the increased production rates. […]
Making Old Newspapers Searchable: The Next Era
Despite achieving the means to print in mass quantities, the publishing industry’s productivity was largely constrained by the need to set type by hand. By 1880, the Linotype Printing machine was invented. The machine used a keyboard, which allowed an entire line of type to be laid at once. The requisite time and effort to […]
Making Old Newspapers Searchable: The History of Printing
Until the first part of the 19th century, the composition and typesetting were accomplished by painstakingly placing each individual letter into a “galley” by hand. The galleys were then placed into a “chase” that was the size of the final page. Since each letter was placed individually, there was no method for standardization or uniformity.If […]
Making Old Newspapers Searchable: The Beginning
The newspaper industry in the United States has evolved considerably over the last 300 years. Each development in the typesetting methods, printing process, and paper stock created unique challenges in adapting the digital image of old newspapers to a searchable format. Digitization Of Historical Newspapers & OCR (Optical Character Recognition) “What history buffs want is […]