The Oregon Digital Newspaper Program recently completed work on several newspapers that published for specific audiences. Unlike newspapers for a city or town which provide news, opinion, and advertisements for a general audience, these titles provided specialized news for communities that might not get their needs met with general newspapers. Oregon has many newspapers that fall into this category, with publications for ethnic communities, LGBTQ folks, religious groups, migrant farmworkers, and high schools, to name just a few.

Portland Labor Press began publishing in 1900 by a consortium of trade unions, and is still in print today as Northwest Labor Press. This newspaper provides coverage of labor movements and issues affecting working people in the Pacific Northwest, as well as national and global news.

Northwest Labor Press sponsored digitization of historic issues from 1900-1916, for a total of 4,664 pages.

• Portland Labor Press (1900-1915)
• Oregon Labor Press (1915-1916)

The Portland Observer is an African American newspaper published in Portland since 1970. A University of Oregon law professor wrote a grant to sponsor digitization of the complete run of this remarkable publication, a total of 2,551 issues. The Portland Observer provided news that was often ignored by the Oregonian and other mainstream newspapers, including stories about housing, education, police brutality, access to jobs, and displacement and gentrification within African American neighborhoods. The Portland Observer also provided a crucial means of connecting and celebrating the African American community in Portland with stories about families, church activities, community groups, activism, music and dance events, and ads for Black-owned businesses.

• The Portland Observer (1970-2022; more recent issues are forthcoming)

The Torch of Reason was a weekly newspaper published by Liberal University in Silverton. Liberal University was established in the 1890s as a secular university that aimed to educate students in “the sciences, such as economics, politics, ethics, art and the religious meaning of science and humanity, in a word, the higher and final motives and purposes of life.” The Torch of Reason embraced “freethinking,” science, and reason as a stance against religious conservatism, which dominated American society at the time, according to Silverton historian Gus Frederick, who sponsored the digitization project through the Silverton Country Historical Society and a successful community kickstarter campaign.

• Torch of Reason (1896-1903)