The Historic Oregon Newspaper Program (ODNP) has recently been able to add exciting new content from Cascade Locks, Oregon. Now available online, issues from March 3, 1939 to September 1, 1939 of the Cascade Locks Chronicle and The Bonneville Dam Chronicle are ready for your viewing pleasure! Covering the period directly after the construction of the Bonneville Dam, this newly added content is a great addition to our already digitized issues of The Dam Chronicle and The Bonneville Dam Chronicle, earlier papers published in Cascade Locks. This project was made possible by sponsorship from the Hood River Library.

More than just a wonderful addition to our previously digitized issues of the Bonneville Dam Chronicle, the Cascade Locks Chronicle and The Bonneville Dam Chronicle is actually continuation of that paper under a new name! An article published on March 3, 1939 explains that because the construction of the Bonneville Dam had reached its completion, the paper saw it fit to change its name to the Cascade Locks Chronicle, the town in which it was published.

The addition of the Cascade Locks Chronicle and The Bonneville Dam Chronicle to our digitized newspapers works as a bookend for our collection of digitized papers on the construction of the Bonneville Dam in Cascade Locks, OR. The construction of the Bonneville Dam was a momentous and important moment in Oregon’s history. When its construction finished in the 1930’s, it was the largest dam of its kind in the United States! Anyone looking to do further research on the Bonneville Dam can find a wealth of information and primary source material on the Oregon Historic Newspapers website. As of now, we have three different papers published about the Bonneville Dam digitized online. These papers are the Dam Chronicle (1934), the Bonneville Dam Chronicle (1934-1939), and the newly added Cascade Locks Chronicle and The Bonneville Chronicle (1939).

Doing research through ODNP is easy thanks to optical character recognition (OCR) technology, which allows our issues to be keyword searchable! In addition, these historic Cascade Locks’ titles, as well as all of our digitized newspapers, can be downloaded as a PDF or JPEG file and saved for future reference or research purposes. All these services are at absolutely no cost to visitors of Historic Oregon Newspapers so don’t wait, and take a look at Oregon’s historic newspapers today!

The Oregon Digital Newspaper Program is excited to announce the addition of our first content from West Linn, Oregon! The Amplifier, now available for browsing on our website, was the school newspaper at West Linn High School. Able to claim an impressive publication record of nearly 100 years, The Amplifier has been up and running since 1921! Our added issues cover a date range from April 29, 1983 to April 1, 2011, and provide an inside look at the Oregon high school experience! This project was made possible by the generosity of the West Linn Historical Society.

Flipping through the digitized pages of The Amplifier, different facets of high school life fill the pages. These memories, perhaps some of which we never thought we would have to think of again (school lunch, the SAT and ACT, school dances, etc.), are presented with an authenticity only a student currently experiencing these events could provide.

Many of the titles the Oregon Digital Newspaper Program has available offer an incredible glimpse of life and nostalgia for the generations alive during their publication. The newly added Amplifier provides a unique opportunity for younger generations to look back on nostalgic events from their own adolescence.

If you want to learn more about what high school was like in West Linn, Oregon, or look back on your own high school experience, take a look at the digitized issues of The Amplifier on the Historic Oregon Newspapers website! Doing research through ODNP is easy thanks to optical character recognition (OCR), which allows all of our newspapers to be keyword searchable. In addition, The Amplifier, as well as all of our digitized titles, can be downloaded as a PDF or JPEG file and saved for future reference or research purposes. All of these services are free and fully available to the public, so don’t hesitate and take a look at Oregon’s historic newspapers today!

The Oregon Digital Newspaper Program has recently been able to add five new historic newspapers to our website, all coming from Stayton, Oregon! Issues from The Stayton Sun, The Stayton Times, Stayton Siftings, Stayton Standard, and the Stayton Mail are now available online. This exciting new addition to our digitized titles provides a comprehensive look at Stayton, covering a time period from December 19, 1889 to May 25, 1916. We are incredibly grateful for the generosity of our donors, who make projects like this possible. This project was funded by grants from the National Society Daughters of the American Revolution, the Pacific Power Foundation, Marion Cultural Development Corporation, and the City of Stayton Community Fund.

The Stayton Times was established in 1890 and was the first newspaper in town. It was originally run by Walter Lyon, who had at one point been secretary to Governor Geer. Three years later, the paper was bought by Horace Mann, who when in February of 1896 refused to sell the paper to E. F. Bennet, the Stayton Mail was born.

E. F. Bennett began the Stayton Mail in 1896 after he was unable to take ownership of the Stayton Times. Along with his son, H. E. Bennett, he increased the size of the paper to eight pages and eventually sold it to H. E. Brown in 1900. Around this time a new paper, The Stayton Sun, was started by T. H. McGill. After operating as publisher for only a year, H. E. Brown sold the Stayton Mail to E. D. Alexander in 1901. Later, Alexander would start a new paper, the Stayton Standard, which would eventually consolidate with the Mail. During this period another paper was born, the Stayton Siftings, run by John Alden Seabury with the motto “Truth and Facts.”

These newly added Stayton titles provide an example of the quick turnover time characteristic of Oregon’s historic newspapers. To find out about other aspects of life in Stayton from the turn of the century to WW1, take a look at these newspapers on the Historic Oregon Newspapers website. Each issue of The Stayton Sun, The Stayton Times, Stayton Siftings, Stayton Standard, and the Stayton Mail can be browsed and searched by keyword, thanks to optical character recognition (OCR) technology. In addition, these historic Stayton, Oregon newspapers can be downloaded as a PDF or JPEG file and saved for future reference or research purposes at absolutely no cost to visitors to Historic Oregon Newspapers. So don’t wait, and take a look at Oregon’s historic newspapers today!

This blog post was written in reference to:

George S. Turbull. History of Oregon Newspapers. Binfords & Mort Publishers, Portland, Oregon. 1939.

Oregon Historic Newspapers has recently been able to add new content from Dallas, OR! This project was made possible, in part, by funding from the Polk County Cultural Coalition. The added issues come from The Dallas Itemizer and the The Polk County Itemizer and cover a period of the paper’s publications from 1876 to 1903.

The Dallas Itemizer was a predecessor to The Polk County Itemizer, changing its name to the latter in 1879 by publisher George E. Good. Our newly added time-span was a formative period for The Itemizer, and the paper underwent an incredible amount of changes in ownership. From 1876 to 1903, a total of 10 different individuals each had a turn as publisher!

One publisher, W. A. Wash, who took over the paper in June 1888 was considered to be quite the ‘interesting’ editor. Wash didn’t utilize much space for set editorials and instead dispensed his own moralistic opinions throughout the paper at will. These examples are taken from just one issue on December 15, 1893.

To see more of the The Dallas Itemizer or The Polk County Itemizer, feel free to browse the span of issues we have digitized on our website. These titles, as with all our historic newspapers, can be browsed and searched by keyword thanks to optical character recognition (OCR). In addition, content can be downloaded as a PDF or JPEG file and saved for future reference or research purposes. All of these services are free and open to the public, so don’t wait and take a look at Oregon’s historic newspapers today!

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This summer, thanks to the generosity from the Friends of the Nyssa Library, Oregon Digital Newspaper Program was able to add new content from Nyssa, Oregon. This new content makes available the Nyssa Gate City Journal during an interesting time span we usually don’t see on the Historic Oregon Newspapers website, from 1937 to 1953!

This span of the Nyssa Gate City Journal covers life in Nyssa through the last of the Great Depression, WW2, and post-war American life. More locally specific, this selection chronicles the introduction of sugar beets to Nyssa’s agricultural economy, a crop that quickly became the foundation upon which the far eastern Oregon town came to survive on.

The start of our available issues of the Nyssa Gate City Journal could not be timelier for they coincide with the construction of the Amalgamated Sugar Company’s factory in Nyssa. The newspaper positioned itself as a promoter of the budding industry and began to push the people of Nyssa to grow sugar beets.

The Amalgamated Sugar Company did well in Nyssa; its factory remained operational until 2005. Perhaps it was due to solely the quality of the town’s surrounding land, but looking through the Nyssa Gate City Journal’s aggressive advertising campaign it seems that paper-based factors may have been equally at play.

To see more of the Nyssa Gate City Journal, feel free to browse the span of issues we have digitized on our website. This title, as with all our historic newspapers, can be browsed and searched by keyword thanks to optical character recognition (OCR). In addition, content can be downloaded as a PDF or JPEG file and saved for future reference or research purposes. All of these services are free and open to the public, so don’t wait and take a look at Oregon’s historic newspapers today!

We have recently been able to add a new paper to the Oregon Historic Newspapers website, this time coming from Newberg, OR! Thanks to the generosity of the Newberg Public Library, ODNP has been able to digitize a large span of the Newberg Graphic, one of the historic newspapers from Newberg dating back to 1888. The large span of the Graphic we now have available, from 1888 to 1922, records the growth and development of Newberg and interestingly, small snippets from the early life of our 31^st United States President Herbert Hoover.

In 1885, Herbert (Bert) Hoover moved to Newberg, OR at age 9 after both his parents passed away. Though Hoover moved to Salem to work with his uncle at age 13, he continued to visit his friends and family in Newberg and thus remained a figure in the local news section of the Graphic. These entirely commonplace mentions offer insight into the young president when he was still regarded as a regular small town Oregon boy.

To see more of the Newberg Graphic, feel free to browse the large span of issues we have digitized on our website. This title, as with all our historic newspapers, can be browsed and searched by keyword thanks to optical character recognition (OCR). In addition, content can be downloaded as a PDF or JPEG file and saved for future reference or research purposes. All of these services are free and open to the public, so don’t wait and take a look at Oregon’s historic newspapers today!

Thanks to the generosity of the Cottage Grove Historical Museum, we have recently been able to expand upon our available issues of the Cottage Grove Sentinel! This new content added to the Oregon Historic Newspapers website covers the early years of the Sentinel, a wonderful addition to the current issues we already have digitized. The new issues span from 1909 to 1918, and showcase the aspirational personality of one of Oregon’s most famous editors, Elbert Bede.

Quoted by Oregon’s historic newspaper expert George S. Turnbull, Elbert Bede was “the one man who spent the most time, did the most work, [and] became the best known as the Cottage Grove Editor.” (Turnbull, 269) Bede’s entrepreneurial spirit is evident throughout the newly added historic issues of the Cottage Grove Sentinel, especially in articles like the ones below which were published shortly after Bede took ownership of the paper.

If you want to learn more about the Cottage Grove Sentinel, Elbert Bede, or historic newspapers in general check out our collection of digitized historic newspapers on the Historic Oregon Newspapers website! Doing research through ODNP is easy thanks to optical character recognition (OCR), which allows all of our historic newspapers to be keyword searchable. In addition, this newspaper can be downloaded as a PDF or JPEG file and saved for future reference or research purposes. All of these services are free and fully available to the public, so don’t hesitate and take a look at what historic Oregon was like through the newspapers that documented it!

References:

Turnbull, George S. History of Oregon Newspapers. Binfords & Mort, Publishers. Portland, OR. 1939.