British Library to digitise old newspapers and put them online

The British Library is to digitise up to 40m newspaper pages and then make them available online. They will include papers - local, regional and national - dating back to the early 1700s.

The vast majority of the library's 750m pages of newspapers — the largest collection in the world — are currently available only on microfilm or bound in bulky volumes.

And, without wishing to be rude to the staff at Colindale, north London, accessing them is a slow and often frustrating bureaucratic process. As for reading them, the task of turning page after page or scrolling through pages of microfilm is time-consuming and wearing on the eyes.

The library said it would focus initially on digitising papers that document historical events in the 19th century, such as the Crimean War, the Boer War and the suffragette movement.

"Newspapers are designed to be read once and thrown away, so they're very fragile," said library spokesman Ben Sanderson. "This will be the largest mass digitisation of historic newspapers the UK has ever seen."

The cost of the 10-year project - to be carried out by online publisher Brightsolid - is not clear, but Sanderson said the process — from cleaning a single page to making a file of it — costs up to £1.

The library's chief executive, Dame Lynne Brindley, said: "It will help the newspaper collection to remain relevant for a new generation of researchers, more used to accessing research information via their laptop than travelling to a physical location."

David Fordham, president of the Newspaper Society spoke of it being "a hugely significant and exciting" initiative. "It will unlock many of the great newspaper treasures", he said.

Sources: AP/Google/Brightsolid