According to an AP article currently circulating, the University of Tennessee will manage a project wherein about 2500 rolls of Tennessee newspapers on microfilm will be digitized and posted as part of the “Chronicling America” project. The project concentrates on papers published between 1836 and 1922.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) ― A couple of years from now, scholars of Tennessee history and the mildly curious will be able to go online and read what some call “first drafts of history” — newspaper accounts written at the time events occurred.
Tennessee will join 15 other states — Kentucky and Virginia among them — in putting archival pages from dozens of newspaper online.
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The state library has some 20,000 rolls of microfilm negatives that chronicle newspaper publishing statewide. The collection includes editions of The Knoxville Gazette, which was Tennessee’s first newspaper, begun in 1791.
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The University of Tennessee will manage the project and some 100,000 pages of Tennessee newspapers will be available for viewing as part of The National Endowment for the Humanities “Chronicling America” Internet project. They will later also be available through a UT website…
