Chronicling America Archives - Tennessee Newspaper Digitization Project

Notable Newsies Series – No.4

Nan Corrigan

Mrs Frank M Bates — The Day Book [Chicago]. July 1, 1912.

Click on the image to read the rest of the story.

Chronicling America Update

The final batch for Phase II has been uploaded to Chronicling America!

Camden Chronicle Ad 1915 — Camden Chronicle. August 20, 1915.

This batch contains further issues of titles already available on Chronicling America:
The Camden Chronicle (1904-1916)
The Pulaski Citizen (1887-1889)
Clarksville Daily Chronicle | Clarksville Evening Chronicle | Clarksville Evening Tobacco Leaf-Chronicle | Daily Tobacco Leaf-Chronicle (1884-1892)
Knoxville Daily Chronicle (1881-1882)

TNDP Phase III officially begins September 1. An Advisory Board meeting will be held soon to discuss the title selection for this next phase.

We look forward to bringing you another 100,000 pages of historical Tennessee newspapers.

Chronicling America Update

KDC18800805 p1 FrontPage — Knoxville Daily Chronicle. August 5, 1880.
Cornerstone for UT’s Agricultural Hall laid!

The penultimate batch for the 2012-14 TNDP award cycle was uploaded to Chronicling America this morning. The batch includes one “new” title and the continuation of several others:

Bolivar Bulletin (1889-1900)

Clarksville Weekly Chronicle (1876-1890)

Columbia Herald & Mail | Herald & Mail | Columbia Herald (1873-1901)

Knoxville Daily Chronicle (1873-1880) [new!]

The final batch for this award cycle should be uploaded soon.

Chronicling America Update

Another batch of Tennessee newspapers has been added to Chronicling America. This batch includes Bolivar Bulletin 1882-1889; Camden Chronicle 1895-1903; Lawrence Democrat 1906-1913; Morristown Gazette 1879-1884; Sequachee News and Sequachee Valley News 1895-1909.

There will be two more batches under TNDP’s current NEH award. Earlier this year we applied for a third (and final) award to continue digitizing Tennessee’s historical newspapers. We will hear in July if our application was successful.

Sequachee [Sequatchie] Valley News front page — Sequachee [Sequatchie] Valley News. January 3, 1901.

Historical Newspapers and Genealogy

Historical newspapers are a great resource for genealogists. In addition to the birth, marriage, and death announcements, other useful items include legal and court notices, advertisements, community and social events, and local news. The minutiae of everyday life take on greater significance 100 or so years after publication. Newspapers often published lists of names, whether for letters left at the post office, passenger lists, hotel registrations, or military lists. These small threads of information may seem trivial or incidental to the casual reader, but for the genealogist they enrich the fabric of family histories.

List of letters at post office — Southern Standard [McMinnville, TN]. August 13, 1887.

The local news section can often provide family historians with intriguing anecdotes about their forebears. I was recently invited to write a short piece for the Warren County Genealogical Association Bulletin. Editor Chris Keathley shared an interesting piece about a WCGA member’s ancestor:

Nashville Union and American. July 1, 1873. — Nashville Union and American. July 11, 1873.

TNGenWeb Coordinator (and TNDP Advisory Board member!), Taneya Koonce, has created the Historical News Portal specifically for sharing and indexing historical news about individuals in Tennessee. “Items on this site are selectively chosen from various newspapers with focus on items of genealogical & family history relevance such as births, marriages, and deaths and interesting stories.” Articles such as the one below give a wonderful glimpse into the social life of our early 20th century ancestors:

Surprise Party article — Nashville Globe. January 18, 1907.

The TNGenWeb’s Historical News Portal provides a transcription of the article, along with a link to the item in Chronicling America, and a list of names appearing in the article (which can be cross-referenced, if they appear in other articles). The site also allows for comments, so genealogists can leave useful information for others. Check out the portal, and its parent site TNGenWeb.

Chronicling America Update

The Rugbeian. Gardneing illustration. — The Rugbeian. June 1881.

Another two batches of Tennessee newspapers have been added to Chronicling America. Titles include the Lawrence Democrat (1890-1906), Savannah Courier (1885-1901), Maryville Times (1885-1899), the Rugbeian (1881-1891), Morristown Gazette (1868-1878), and the Johnson City Comet (1884-1909).

Explore some of the interesting illustrations in the Rugbeian, and take a look at the Comet’s ornamental masthead:

“12 Years a Slave” in Chronicling America

Our friends at the Vermont Digital Newspaper Project shared this link to today’s blog post:

“Fresh from Oscar fever & “12 Years a Slave” winning Best Film 2014, Pruedence Doherty (our Special Collections Librarian) dug into our digitized content and found accounts of Solomon Northup kidnapping, subsequent rescue, and persecutions of his kidnappers. Read more about it!”

https://vtdnp.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/watchman1853feb10_3.jpg — Vermont Watchman and State Journal. February 10, 1853.

Further references to Solomon Northup’s narrative can be found by using Chronicling America’s Advanced Search option. However, note that his last name is spelled both as Northup and Northrop.

Thanks to Erenst, Prudence, and all at VDNP for sharing this.

Even more Tennessee papers added to Chronicling America

One more batch of Tennessee newspapers was added to Chronicling America last week. This included issues of the Nashville Globe, 1907-1913, and the Southern Standard from McMinnville, 1880-1891.

Southern Standard [McMinnville]. February 14, 1891.