Historical society preserves centuries of county newspapers

CHESTER >> Over the past four years, a team of Delaware County Historical Society volunteers have sifted through hundreds of centuries-old newspapers, scanning them onto CDs to make it more accessible and user friendly to the visiting public.

The team of Kim Jovinelli, now curator of the Clock Museum in Lancaster, Pa., Keith Lockhart, Anthony Szurkowski and Mary Giove sorted through more than 160 newspapers and catalogued and scanned both bound and unbound copies. The Delaware County Historical Society began acquiring these copies around 1950.

Swarthmore College Library lent Lockhart their scanner. Another institution, the Delaware County Institute of Science in Media, allowed 13 newspaper volumes in their collection, five of the Delaware County American and eight of the Delaware County Republican, to be included in the Delaware County Historical Society scan.

The vast majority of the newspapers belong to the Delaware County Historical Society and range from single issues like the 1895 issue of the Chester Paper to multiple copies like the five issues of The Post Boy from 1819 to 1824 to editions spanning decades.

Some of those include the Morton Chronicle dating back to 1880 and some as recent as 1983; the Upland Union from 1826; the South Chester News from 1889 to 1993; the Delco Record from 1903 to 1905; issues of the Millbourne Observer from 1908; 1899 and 1900 editions of Delco Graphics; 1900 editions of the Media Advertiser; April, May and June issues of the Morning Republican; the Chester News of 1901; the Chester Advocate between 1872 and 1874; editions from the 1879 Chester Daily Times; multiple issues from the late 19th century of the Chester Evening News and the Media Advertiser; various issues of the Chester Times, including its 75th anniversary edition; the 1860 Delco American; and multiple issues ranging from 1826 to 1860 of the Upland Union.

To date, there are 241 CD’s in the historical society collection and others are continuing to be processed.

Any of these issues can be viewed by accessing the scanned CD collection housed at the Delaware County Historical Society Research Museum, Library & Research Center. The museum is open to the public from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Wednesday and Friday; 1 to 6:30 p.m. Thursday; and 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday. The museum’s telephone number is 610-872-0502. Parking is free on the society lot behind the building or across the street in the municipal lot.