Newspapers have been printed since the early days of the printing press, and for decades, they were the most constant source for information in communities. Historic local newspapers provide a snapshot of a community, its businesses, and its relationship to the nation, with local news, marriages, and obituaries printed alongside national and international headlines, providing instant context of the local news against a larger historical events.
Since newspapers are such an important resource for local history research, we are excited to announce that there are thousands more pages of Mansfield newspapers available online through our digital newspaper archive!
The digital newspaper archive project started several years ago, in partnership with the Ohio Genealogical Society, the Mansfield Memorial Museum, and the Richland County Chapter of the Ohio Genealogical Society, and was funded by an initial grant from the Gorman Foundation. This year, the Mansfield/Richland County has digitized an additional 31 reels of microfilm, making tens of thousands of additional historic newspaper pages freely available online.
The new additions include a portion of MRCPL’s holdings of the Mansfield Daily Journal (sometimes published as the Mansfield Journal) from September 1924 to December 1926. Prior to this digitization effort, the Daily Journal was only available in person at the Main Library, as there are no other known sources remaining for this newspaper.
In addition to the Journal, additional years of the Richland Shield and Banner and the Weekly and Semi-Weekly News (these are the same newspaper, but over the course of its publication years it changed its frequency) are now available online. For the Shield and Banner, newspapers from 2 May 1891 to 12 June 1913 are now available online. For the Weekly/Semi-Weekly News, newspapers from 8 January 1891to 29 December 1910 are now available online.
No library card or login information is required, and you do not have to be at the library to use the digital archive. The digital newspaper archive is keyword searchable, or you can browse by newspaper title or publication date. Find all our digitized newspapers online here: https://mrcpl.advantage-preservation.com/ . There is also a link on the Sherman Room webpage under “Online Resources.”
Want to see a newspaper page that is not available online? As always, the microfilm archives are available in person during Sherman Room hours, or send a request with your specific request (names, dates, and pages appreciated) to genealogy@mrcpl.org.
Snippets from the First Daily Journal Editions
Explore the first Mansfield Daily Journal issue, published 13 September 1924, in its entirety here.
The Sherman Room at MRCPL 