UW Libraries-Led Project Adds First Set of Wyoming Newspapers to National Database

The Wyoming Digital Newspaper Project, led by University of Wyoming Libraries, has added its first batch of historical newspapers to the Chronicling America database.

The Northern Wyoming Herald and Garland Irrigation Era, published from 1911-1924, as well as a portion of the Cheyenne Daily Leader, widely recognized as Wyoming’s first newspaper, recently became available for anyone to view via the Chronicling America database at https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/.  

Chronicling America is a free, searchable database of historical American newspapers from 1789-1963. Launched in 2007, Chronicling America is part of the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP), a partnership between the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the Library of Congress to create a national digital resource of historically significant United States newspapers.

Last year, UW Libraries received a nearly $209,000 grant from NEH to support the Wyoming Digital Newspaper Project over two years. The project involves the digitization of 100,000 pages of Wyoming historical newspapers -- dating from 1863-1963 -- as part of the state’s participation in the NDNP.

The project began in January after a selection board prioritized newspaper titles late last year.

“Despite the pandemic, and thanks to the university’s dedication to maintaining a safe work environment, the project has not faced many setbacks,” says Amanda Lehman, a UW assistant librarian and co-project investigator of the NEH grant. 

Microfilmed newspapers are gathered from the Wyoming State Archives in Cheyenne. The UW project team duplicates and digitizes them for inclusion in the Chronicling America database.

The next state newspapers to be added to the database are the Platte Valley Lyre, The Saratoga Sun, the Cody Enterprise and the Park County Herald.

UW project team members are Lehman; Bryan Ricupero, an associate librarian and co-project investigator; Rachael Laing, a library specialist, as the project specialist; Samantha Peter, an instructional design librarian, as the project facilitator; and Madison Glenn, from Moorcroft, a student worker on the project.