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Exploring a Newspaper Title Record

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The following is a guest post by Henry Carter, a Digital Conversion Specialist in the Serial and Government Publications Division.

Through its enhanced search interface, the new Chronicling America offers even more options to search the collection than the previous version. This post will explore how to use the unique features of a newspaper title record to find detailed information for each individual newspaper. While the previous versions of Chronicling America also included title records, they are in a different location on the new site.

What is a Title Record?

On the bottom of every image in Chronicling America, basic information about the newspaper title will be present. For those looking to dig a little deeper, the newspaper title record provides a list of  “Libraries that Have It,” a title history essay (if available), a calendar browse view and the newspaper catalog record.

The title record has three tabs you can select: “About this Newspaper,” “Libraries that Have It” and “Browse Digitized Issues.” Let’s look at what information we can find in each tab using The Bamberg Herald as our example.

screenshot of the newspaper title record page for the bamberg herald. There is a number one under about this newspaper, a number 2 under libraries that have it and a number 3
The “About this Newspaper” page for The Bamberg Herald.

About This Newspaper

The first tab “About this Newspaper” contains the title history essay (if available) and cataloging information. Click “Show More” to read the full history essay written by the state partner who digitized the newspaper. The cataloging information will tell you the dates of publication, the publisher, the location, and any notes, for example the publishing frequency. The dates of publication may be different from the issue dates available in Chronicling America as some issues were not available for digitization. At this time, Chronicling America only contains content through 1963 due to copyright. Content that was digitized more than a few years ago may stop at 1922, the previous end of public domain content.

Finding Libraries that Have It

The “Libraries that Have It” tab provides information about holdings at other institutions, that can include print, microfilm, and digital holdings. You can access this tab via the link at the top of the page as well as a link within the right-hand side gray “Availability” box. Please note different date ranges may be available at different institutions, and this may be different than what is available in Chronicling America. If you want to access newspapers not available in Chronicling America, we recommend that you reach out to the holding institution or work with your local library.

screenshot of the libraries that have it tab in chronicling america for the newspaper the bamberg herald
A list of “Libraries that Have It” for The Bamberg Herald.

Browse Digitized Issues

The “Browse Digitized Issues” tab allows a user to browse a calendar view of digitized issues. The calendar view is useful if you are trying to determine the schedule of a newspaper that is published weekly, biweekly, triweekly, etc. It is also helpful to see at a glance if there are any issues missing from Chronicling America. These may not have been available at the time of digitization, or they may not have been published. For example, in this calendar view for 1899, the University of South Carolina did not digitize issues before July 13, and the July 20 and August 24 issues are missing.

Additional Features: Rights & Access, Cite This Item

At the bottom of the page, you can click the “+” signs for additional information about rights associated with the item under “Rights & Access,” and for auto-generated citations under “Cite This Item.”

Bottom of the About This Newspaper page for the Bamberg Herald with Rights & Access and Cite This Items links.
The “Rights & Access” and “Cite This Item” section for The Bamberg Herald.

How to Find the Title Record

You can get to a title record through multiple paths. One way is through the “All Digitized Titles” list.  Click on the title of the newspaper you are interested in from the list, and this will take you to the title record.

All Digitized Titles list showing the digitized newspapers from South Carolina. The title The Bamberg Herald from Bamberg South Carolina is circled.
All Digitized Titles list, featuring the Bamberg Herald.

Searching for a Title Record

You can also search for a particular newspaper record using the advanced search. Select “Collection Items” and then “Titles” to search for a newspaper by title.

Results of a title search of the Collection Items using the terms “Bamberg Herald” in a keyword search.
Search results for the Bamberg Herald.

 

Navigating to the Title Record from a Newspaper

You can also access the title record page from any newspaper page view or issue view by clicking the “About this Newspaper” link. If you you are looking at an individual newspaper page or issue,  you would select the “About this Title” link to access the newspaper title record. Both links can be found just above the image of the newspaper issue or page.

screenshot of the four page issue of the bamberg herald on chronicling america dated october 5 1899 with a orange circle around about the this title link
The Bamberg Herald in Chronicling America from October 5, 1899.

The Chronicling America historic newspapers online collection is a product of the National Digital Newspapers Program and jointly sponsored by the Library and the National Endowment for the Humanities. For more guidance on how to use the newly enhanced features of Chronicling America, take a look at Chronicling America: A Guide for Researchers. This guide provides an overview of the collection as well as recommended search topics, search strategies, website features, and frequently asked questions. Try out a search in the new Chronicling America interface today!

Comments (2)

  1. Thank you for this useful information! Let me see if I got one detail right — am I correct to think that the Bamberg Herald’s name was unchanged thru its period of publication? I know that some newspapers made adjustments to their masthead names as time passed. I will assume that a title record would report on those name changes and the dates when they occurred, no?

    • Yes, the title records have a section for “preceding titles” and “succeeding titles” that link to the connected titles or related titles. It’s really helpful for tracing title changes over the years. If a newspaper title has changed it will get a new title record.

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