Free Newspaper Archives in the US
Northeast
Some of the earliest newspaper archives in the US are found along the East coast, home to the original thirteen colonies where it all began. Here are the best free newspaper archives from the NorthEastern US.
Maryland Newspaper Archives
The Marlyland State Archives, mostly 1800′s. Sporadic coverage of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Archives are browseable by date, but there is no full text searching.
Find more Maryland newspapers at NewspaperArchive.com. Try it today!
Massachusetts Newspaper Archives
Barnstable Patriot (1830-1930), the Hyannis Patriot, and the Sandwich Observer (all on Cape Cod, MA). Full text search, courtesy of the Sturgis Library.
Provincetown Banner and The Advocate, 1918 and 1931-67(1935 missing). Full text search, and image retrieval.
Find more Massachusetts newspapers at NewspaperArchive.com. Try it today!
New Hampshire Newspaper Archives
New Hampshire Gazette, the first newspaper printed in New Hampshire. Formerly housed at the University of NH website, this now only seems to be available at the Wayback machine. There is only a single edition here, and it’s 4-pages at that, but it’s from 1756, and worth a visit.
Find more New Hampshire newspapers at NewspaperArchive.com. Try it today!
Discover your Ancestors at Ancestry.com!
The Civil War Newspaper Archives
Philadelphia Inquirer Civil War Archive, 1860-1865 The Civil War, from a Northern point of view.
Find more Civil War, WWI, WWII newspapers at NewspaperArchive.com. Try it today!
New Jersey Newspaper Archives
Atlantic County, NJ (includes Atlantic City), 1860-1923
Red Bank Register, (Middletown, NJ) 1878-1947. Full text searching available. The site anticipated expanding the collection through 1991.
South Amboy Citizen, 1910-1944. Browse by date, but no text searching. Page images available.
New The New Brunswick Daily Times and other papers, 1871-1908.
Find more New Jersey newspapers at NewspaperArchive.com. Try it today!
Discover your Ancestors at Ancestry.com!
New York Newspaper Archives
Brooklyn Daily Eagle, 1841-1902 One of my favorite newspapers…a great glimpse into nineteenth century New York.
The New York Times archives, 1853-current. One of the world’s great newspaper archives. All papers before 1923 and after 1987 are available free of charge, but there’s a fee for any dates in between...go figure!
Northern New York newspaper archives, 1844-2004 There’s a scattered assortment of interesting newspapers here, but they can only be searched one paper at a time.
Suffolk County, Long Island, NY, 1830′s-1906, A surprisingly diverse collection.
New Old New York State Historical Newspaper Pages, 18th-20th centuries. An odd collection to be sure, but with more than 10 million newspaper pages from across NY, it’s certainly a valuable one. Take a look at the FAQ for a description of the collection.
New Rochester area newspapers, from Monroe County Library, ca 1800′s. A small collection with a difficult search interface. Try this search as an alternative. Papers can be browsed, and once opened as a PDF, can be text searched.
Find more New York newspapers at NewspaperArchive.com. Try it today!
Pennsylvania Newspaper Archives
Philadelphia Inquirer Civil War Archive, 1860-1865 The war from a Northern perspective.
Lancaster County, PA Newspaper Archives, 1816-1889, and 1915-2001. Several online newspaper archives, including the oddly-named Columbia Spy.
Tioga County, PA Newspaper Archives, 1838-2006. From Wellsboro, PA, courtesy of the Green Free Public Library.
Penn State Newspaper Archives. There are several collections here, including their Civil War collection, along with archives of student newspapers, and an assortment of articles from Lancaster Farming from the 1950′s onward.
Smethport, PA newspaper archives, McKean County, 1833-1977. A broad collection from Pennsylvania mining country, made available by the Hamlin memorial Library.
Pennsylvania Digital Archive, including the Nazareth Item (1891-1975) and the new Holland Clarion in Lancaster County (1873-1950), There are many other digitized archives here as well in the varied but unfortunately, not very well-described collection.
Pennsylvania Civil War Newspaper Archives, 1831-1877. Assorted papers including eight archived papers from Gettysburgh. Full page images and full text search.
The Chester, PA newspaper archives, 1876-1976, includes the Chester Times, Delaware County Daily Times, and others.
New Access Pennsylvania Digital Repository. There is a lot here, though the collection is not well described. 19th and early 20th century newspapers along with other digital materials. To zero in on the newspapers, used Advanced Search, enter newspaper and choose Description as the field to search on.
New Ambler Gazette, 1894-1931. Courtesy of the Wissahickon Valley Public Library in Montgomery County, browseable by date.
Find more Pennsylvania newspapers at NewspaperArchive.com. Try it today!
Discover your Ancestors at Ancestry.com!
Other NorthEast Newspaper Archives
Another source of millions of pages of newspaper archives from the North East can be found at NewspaperArchive.com. This is not a free service, but it’s a great resource, just the same.
More historical archives and research materials can be found at these excellent resources:
| Genealogy Tools | European Historical Newspapers |
| International Historical Newspapers | Court Record Searches |
| Public Records Searches | Ancestry.com |
Other pages at this site:
| National Collections | NorthEastern United States | The South |
| The MidWest States | Western States | Special Collections |