Online Sources

[Scottish]

The Times is available for students through their educational institutions via the ATHENS programme. The New York Times is fully digitised and is free for the years 1851-1922 and 1987-2007 inclusive. 1923-1986 is a paid service. The Guardian and Observer have just become available up to the end of 1975. These are paid services but there is a 24-hour free trial.

Of course the amount of Scottish football content is somewhat limited (though internationals and inter-league are generally well covered) but it still throws up surprises. The NYT is surprisingly good during WW1 for instance though it does have that American tendency to pluralise everything - "The Celtics played The Rangers"

The British Library made a start a few years back with the News of the World, Guardian, Daily News and Weekly Dispatch but made little progress. There's an online list of archives here but it's quite heavily American.

There's a Wiki page of online papers but again very few of direct relevance.

The Mitchell apart, the collections at the NLS and the National Newspaper Library at Colindale would be a fantastic resource to have available online. However the problem is less the libraries than the papers themselves. They realise there's gold in them thar old newsprint. Libraries obtain copies of newspapers under certain conditions. Making them freely available worldwide via the web isn't one of them.

For anyone who is able to get to Colindale in addition to newspapers they also have a quite extensive collection of match programmes (all Killie 1929-1940 for example), magazines and Saturday night sports specials.

See this list here

Unlike the main British Library you don't need a Reader's Ticket for Colindale but in my experience (though it has been some time since I was there) advance notification of what you are looking for will save masses of time.

Please add any other online sources by replying to this post.

[Sat31March1928]

Like a kid in a sweetshop. I've just discovered free access to 200 years of the 'Times Digital Archive'. I email the people hosting the service and

The easiest way for you to gain access is via a public library that offers remote access, i.e. you could become a member and then log-in to it from home. If you let me know your geographic location, I shall point you to the nearest library that offers this. That way, you would have ongoing access and it would be free.


All I had to do was go to my local library here in Kent. Then log on using my library card no

http://www.kent.gov.uk/leisure-and-cult ... dicals.htm

I'll update you on what I find.

[/i]

[Sat31March1928]

few samples

[Sat31March1928]

A few points.

The search facility is very good if you put in 'football' it generally hits the mark.

By looking at the whole page you get it as a 'full page jpeg'. So you can crop it to the bit you want


I've been looking at the years 1951 to 1955.

Coverage is fine for Scottish BC games. Patchy for lesser internationals and league international games. S Cup finals are patchy too e.g. 1955 final has full report on 1st match and a 'sentence' on the replay.

[Scottish]

Patchy for lesser internationals and league international games. S Cup finals are patchy too e.g. 1955 final has full report on 1st match and a 'sentence' on the replay.

You'll find it much the same even after going past 1955. The Hearts- Killie title decider in 1965 is allocated less space than not just the Scottish Cup Final but the English Amateur Cup Final the same day.

I've also more prominence given to the annual Oxford-Cambridge match and the Old Boys Cup Final than some midweek representative games. Which is actually not that surprising given the demographic of the Times readership in those days.

Another problem is that often its the first edition which has been preserved for the paper's own library and they were published too early to carry reports of games outside London.

The Times collection isn't the first place I'd go to in an actual library but given the dearth of digital resources it's a useful addition if you know where to look.

Life would be a lot easier if the Sunday Mail, Sunday Post, Daily Record and Scottish Referee were available online. Or, best of all, the SFA's own cuttings books.

[nightfire]

Patchy for lesser internationals and league international games. S Cup finals are patchy too e.g. 1955 final has full report on 1st match and a 'sentence' on the replay.

You'll find it much the same even after going past 1955. The Hearts- Killie title decider in 1965 is allocated less space than not just the Scottish Cup Final but the English Amateur Cup Final the same day.

I've also more prominence given to the annual Oxford-Cambridge match and the Old Boys Cup Final than some midweek representative games. Which is actually not that surprising given the demographic of the Times readership in those days.

Another problem is that often its the first edition which has been preserved for the paper's own library and they were published too early to carry reports of games outside London.

The Times collection isn't the first place I'd go to in an actual library but given the dearth of digital resources it's a useful addition if you know where to look.

Life would be a lot easier if the Sunday Mail, Sunday Post, Daily Record and Scottish Referee were available online. Or, best of all, the SFA's own cuttings books.

So true . .

The Mitchell Library should have applied for a Lottery Grant/Millenium Fund Grant to digitise all their Newspaper and Poor Relief records. I think it was a golden opportunity missed and now that a lot of Lottery Funding may go towards the London Olympics their chance may have gone.

Anybody any contact with Glasgow Councillors who could be in a position to raise the question.

[Scottish]

I only found out yesterday but The Glasgow Herald 1820-1900 has been available online for the past four months as part of a process digitising the British Library's newspaper collection. Unfortunately it's not free access for everyone but students can access it via the ATHENS programme. Non-students may either have to rely on a partner/friend or sign up to an evening class somewhere.

Further details and a list of available content here

Report of the Scotland-England game on November 30th 1872

[nightfire]

I presume you can only access from the Educational establishment or is it a case of registering from there but you are then able access from home

[Scottish]

If the academic institution is signed up to ATHENS then you can access from any computer with just your log-in and password.

[nightfire]

If the academic institution is signed up to ATHENS then you can access from any computer with just your log-in and password.

Excellent I (sorry my daughter) should be able to gain access

[Sat31March1928]

I presume you can only access from the Educational establishment or is it a case of registering from there but you are then able access from home

I went down my library and I now log on using my library card no.

[nightfire]

Help - I have a Athens login but don't know how to get to the Herald Archive.

Can someone take me thru the process

[Scottish]

Athens>Name of Institution>Available Resources>Gale>British Library 19th century collection>Glasgow Herald

There are a number of magazines available as well but all the 'sporting' ones tend to be of the hunting, shooting and fishing variety rather than hacking, scoring and fouling.

[Scottish]

I went down my library and I now log on using my library card no.

Is it possible to access the 19th century collection via a library card? I am likely to lose my -ahem- "student" access later this year

[nightfire]

Athens>Name of Institution>Available Resources>Gale>British Library 19th century collection>Glasgow Herald

There are a number of magazines available as well but all the 'sporting' ones tend to be of the hunting, shooting and fishing variety rather than hacking, scoring and fouling.

Thanks - so much easier and quicker to find, for example, Celtic's first ever game