Up until summer of 2023, the only way to view issues of the San Jose Mercury News from before 1985 was to pull up a seat at a microfilm reader. All that changed when the San Jose Public Library (SJPL) made the 1900-1985 historic backfile of the Merc available online. Thanks to a special donor, SJPL was able to work with the Newsbank database to digitize and make available this treasure trove to everyone in the state of California for free!
| Image courtesy of San Jose Public Library |
While not connected with San Francisco Public Library at all, the database is available to any California state resident so the staff of the Magazines and Newspapers Center encourages you to set-up your own access to start enjoying.
Read all about the new database on the San Jose Public Library website, and apply for eLibrary Card for Instant Online Access without having to visit a SJPL branch in person.
This post first appeared on San Francisco Public Library Herb Caen Magazines A, please read the originial post: here
