In October 2018, the Robertson Library learned that is project, "Colony, Confederation and Country: Accessing the nation’s story through the lens of Prince Edward Island’s Historical Newspapers", was one of 21 projects selected for funding through the National Heritage Digitization Strategy.
Famously referred to as "the first rough draft of history," newspapers are an important resource for information about individuals, events, and places, and provide context related to political, social, economic and cultural trends. Local newspapers reflect the larger narrative of the evolution of Canada through news, advertisements, notices, and other content gathered from provincial, regional, national, and international sources. We will digitize newspapers from the 1840s to the opening year of the First World War, including The Examiner (1847-1900) and the Island’s first French language newspaper L’Impartial (1893-1915). The Examiner will fill existing gaps in pre-1890 content in our digital collections. L’Impartial documents the development of Acadian identity and in the region and its inclusion in IslandNewspapers.ca will increase language and cultural diversity within the collection. Digitizing L’Impartial is also a preservation and repatriation effort given that portions of the newspaper are in a project that is no longer supported.
We are pleased to report that both the Examiner and L'Impartial are available for browsing.
Learn more about the National Heritage Digitization Strategy (NHDS).
