COGenBlog

I recently checked out the SmallTownPapers Web site and found eight Colorado newspapers. SmallTownPapers has partnered with World Vital Records and claims that they have put a million newspaper pages online. There are currently over 250 small newspapers in the collection. Most of the fifty states have a least one newspaper and many states have five or more. The site is free and there is access to current issues as well as archived issues which could date back to 1865 depending on the publication. The Colorado newspapers had archives ranging from 2004-2006. I was not able to find a list which gave the years available for each individual newspaper.

The newspapers can be searched by keyword with a digital copy of some newspapers available for viewing. You can do a search in all papers, a selected state, a selected title, and by year. If you sign up for a free membership, it allows a search to be saved and you are automatically notified of a new hit when new papers are added.

The Colorado newspapers currently available on SmallTownPapers are:

• Eastern Colorado Plainsman, Hugo, Colorado
• Haxtun-Fleming Herald, Haxton, Colorado
• Kiowa County Press, Eads, Colorado
• The North Weld Herald, Eaton, Coloado
• The Saguache Crescent, Saguache, Colorado
• San Miguel Basin Forum, Nucla, Colorado
• The Trinidad Times Independent, Trinidad, Colorado
• The Wellington Tribune, Wellington, Colorado

SmallTownPapers plans to continue adding to the collection and will post new material as it is completed

Julie Miller’s monthly column is in the 16 February 2007 edition of the Broomfield Enterprise. The topic for February is Line up proof for lineage societies. The article discusses reasons for joining a lineage society and the steps necessary to prepare an application.

Colorado was recently added to the states indexed on the new USGenWeb search page. The search enables a researcher to search all USGenWeb pages within a state or project. It is planned to have every state completed by May 2007. The goal of the project is to have a USGenWeb-wide search.

Daryl Lytton, the creator of the project, has been involved with USGenWeb throughout its ten-year history. He is the coordinator of three USGenWeb sites and the USGenWeb Newsletter Assistant Editor.