An online archive of traditional print issues points viewers to your site

If you are an adviser from a school with decades of traditional print newspapers aging in school file cabinets and library shelves, it’s time to create an online, searchable archive for them.

At my high school, for example, the newspaper class began production of its publication in 1959, a year after its building opened for instruction.

The paper has a long, tradition of news coverage at the school.

Its archive lives at a site created by Small Town Newspapers, who worked with me incrementally whenever I received grant money.  Five decades of newspapers took an estimated $8,000 to archive.  I’m sure there are other ways, perhaps even cheaper, to accomplish this, but I am pleased with the results.

Now, the archive operates as a way for alumni to find the years they attended our school, and the link is available on the school’s overall site and the newspaper’s Print Archive page.

More importantly, one of my students just a few weeks ago squealed when she discovered it on her own, and came up with this idea for a monthly online feature.

My main priority was to make the archive searchable, and that is why I chose to go with a professional service versus try to do this myself.