Newspapers provide a contemporary record of daily life in Maryland. Unfortunately, the deterioration of these valuable historical documents is a serious conservation issue. The paper used since 1865, particularly for newsprint, is not durable. Original newspapers which were available for reference twenty years ago are now so fragile that they can no longer be handled without crumbling to dust. Scanning and microfilming original issues are the most effective and cost-efficient means of preserving the information in newspapers. For those newspapers with images such as photographs, and supplements in color, scanning is the only viable alternative for their preservation.

Since 1979, the Maryland State Archives has cooperated with concerned individuals, historical agencies, libraries, and newspaper publishers in a project that has microfilmed and scanned nearly 300 Maryland newspapers representing over two million pages. An equivalent number of deteriorating pages remain to be preserved, including pages poorly filmed by sources other than the Archives, and pages adequately filmed for text content, but which must be scanned to recover images that are not legible on high contrast copy film.

As long as funding can be secured, the Maryland State Archives will continue to provide state-of-the-art facilities for preserving fragile newspapers and other historic documents. Questions concerning the project should be directed to Jennifer Hafner, Director, Maryland Newspaper Project, mdnewspapers@mdarchives.state.md.us or contact us at 350 Rowe Blvd., Annapolis, MD 21401.

NOTE: Primary access to newspaper collections is through microfilm. Researchers desiring access to original newspapers, particularly Maryland titles formerly in the holdings of the Library of Congress MUST contact the Maryland Newspaper Project in advance.