Chronicling America: Newspapers – Part two

Chronicling America is FREE and easy to use. I’m not an expert user, but if you haven’t visited this site, you may find this post helpful.

Chronicling America website is the result of the NationalDigital Newspaper Project sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities and The Library of Congress. More information is available on the site.

The home screen has three tabs on the left of the screen and on the right is the button to see the entire 1690 to present directory of newspapers.

Search Pages

This tab allows you to search papers from a specific state or from all states. Select the range of years desired. Type in the name or word to search for. 

 The image below shows some of the results of my search in Minnesota papers for the surname Muccio from the years 1890 – 1922.

Red highlights the occurrences of the name. Clicking on a page enlarges it and provides tools for zooming in and out; and viewing other pages of the same issue.

Advanced Search

Gives many options for making your search more specific as shown below.

All Digitized Newspapers 1836-1922

Allows you to select papers from a specific state, those aimed at a specific ethnicity, and/or printed in a specific language.

NOTE:   The above searches look only at those papers that have been digitized.  There are more than 11 million searchable pages at this time.  More are being added as the digitizing process goes on.

Search U.S. Newspaper Directory, 1690 – Present

The directory lists all papers from 1690 including those that have not yet been digitized.  You can browse by newspaper title or select state, county and city and years of publication.

 The image below shows a partial list of papers published in Cincinnati, Ohio. Clicking on the title will give more information about it.

One note of caution: It is easy to get completely wrapped up in reading these old newspapers.  They’re a snapshot of our ancestors’ lives.