Huddersfield Local Studies Library has copies of local newspapers which are held on microfilm and some local newspapers date back to the 19th century. These include the Batley News, Colne Valley Guardian, Dewsbury Reporter and Huddersfield Examiner. The Local Studies Library also holds an incomplete run of the Leeds Mercury, an 18th century newspaper.
Credit: Jon Davis, Kirklees libraries CC BY 2.0.
The British Newspaper Archive (BNA) is a partnership between the British Library and findmypast to digitise up to 40 million newspaper pages from the British Library's vast collection over the next 10 years. It contains newspapers from across the UK, primarily for the 19th century but with a growing number of issues from the first half of the 20th century.
After the main British Library newspaper digitisation project was completed, it became available through the publisher Gale. Then the findmypast.co.uk website began funding further digitisation – that is what now appears in the British Newspaper Archive (BNA). Although Gale has since then then periodically licensed sections of the new BNA content, this does not keep up with the BNA site which is adding new content weekly.
Access to the British Newspaper Archive
Searching is free, but to view the newspapers requires a personal subscription. Unfortunately, BNA can only be subscribed to by individuals – they do not offer an institutional subscription.
The BNA can be viewed for free in the British Library's Reading Rooms.
Here are some potentially useful free resources that the librarians have picked out (feel free to contact us with more you find!):
The British Library aims to acquire all newspapers published in the United Kingdom and in the Republic of Ireland.
The Newsroom, the new dedicated news Reading Room at the British Library in London, is the focal point for researching the news collections. The Newsroom provides access to newspapers in print, microfilm and digital formats.
Guide to Newspapers held by the British Library
This guide provides an overview of the British and overseas newspapers dating back to the 1600s and links to information on the British Library's growing collections of radio, television and web news.
Accessing newspapers held by the British Library
The British Library operates a “surrogate first” policy for its newspaper collection. A surrogate copy will be a microfilm or digital facsimile of the original newspaper and the surrogate will be the Reading Room access copy. Where a surrogate copy exists, the original print newspaper will be labelled as “restricted” on Explore the British Library. This policy is designed to preserve the fragile original newspapers in our care.
Readers may order non-surrogated print newspapers to both the Newsroom at St Pancras and to the Boston Spa Reading Room. Print newspapers stored in the National Newspapers Building take 48 hours to arrive at the Newsroom or the Boston Spa Reading Room. Microfilm newspapers are delivered to the Newsroom at St Pancras within 70 minutes of request. Microfilm is currently not available to order to the Boston Spa Reading Room.
You can request newspaper articles on inter-library loan from other libraries, including the British Library. For information on this services, see our Inter Library loans pages.
