BellaOnline Forums Family Genealogy Newspapers

Our historical society recently was given several boxes of old newspapers dating back to the 1960s and 1970s. These local papers are often a treasure trove of family and local information. There are community sections in the paper and families who live in these communities often would submit to the paper that family was visiting or announce births and other tidbits of family information. There are photos of students who participate in school activities, receive awards, and attend events. I need to make note of all the dates now that the papers have been sorted so that I can find out if the papers have been microfilmed or digitized.

Ten months later - I had scanned about 3000 pages when the contract on the copier scanner was updated and a new piece of equipment arrived. Unfortunately, I was unable to use the new scanner and a flat bed PlusTek scanner was purchased. What a joy it is. Originally I would scan the pages to a jpg file and then I would run OCR and save as a PDF. Now I am able to scan and the setting enables searchable PDF. It is doing a great job. The only process each day is to name the files. The file name is 1969-05-08News-Journalpage and then the page number. As mentioned before, the paper is filled with great family and social information - jobs, scouts, clubs, military, events, places, you name it - a bit time consuming but what fun.

I'm over 5000 pages now. The papers are fun to go through and the articles are informative.

Hello Angie,

This sounds like a fascinating. fun and informative task you have set yourself ... and reading over the years, I am sure you have also seen the change of styles of writing and reporting and of advertising and of course prices! Cheers

llLOL, prices, yes, - $3000 for a car but even then that was a lot of money. Fashions, fun things kids were doing in school; and information about road projects that did come to pass; an annexation issue between the county and the city; all very fascinating. Fun also were marriage notices for people who I met years later.