State of impresso newspaper collection - April 2018

We provide an overview of the current collection. More details about technical aspects will follow in two upcoming blog posts on image format evaluation and data pre-processing.

Where are we ?

As of April 20218, our digitized newspaper collection is mainly composed of Swiss and Luxembourgish newspapers in French and German. If the national libraries of Switzerland and Luxembourg as well as several other institutions agreed right from the project proposal to provide impresso with their newspaper archives, we were confronted in the last months with the need to approach Swiss cantonal libraries as well as private copyrights holders individually. Although not a straightforward process, we all in all succeeded in getting about 20 Swiss and 28 Luxembourgish newspapers so far, most of which are on our servers and being processed. During this phase we benefited from the institutional support of Liliane Regamey from the Swiss national library and from the technical assistance of RERO team, and we would like to address our warmest thanks to both of them.

Swiss newspapers

Our acquisition of swiss newspapers focused so far on the French speaking part of the Confederation (“Romandie”). In general newspaper digitization campaigns started during the second half of the 2000s and are still ongoing or planed. Such activities were coordinated by the national library, in collaboration with cantonal institutions and/or private publishers (La Liberté, Le Nouvelliste, la Société Neuchâteloise de Presse, Le Temps, etc.), often with the support of an association bringing together the main actors. The material to which we have access corresponds to image scans and OCR output, all produced by a private company. Here is the current list of impresso Swiss newspapers:

Title	Resource holder	Lg	From	To
Der Landbote des freiburgischen Seebezirks	Cantonal library of Fribourg	de	1909	1914
Journal du canton de Fribourg	Cantonal library of Fribourg	fr	1830	1833
Le Bien public	Cantonal library of Fribourg	fr	1879	1888
Le Confédéré de Fribourg	Cantonal library of Fribourg	fr	1848	1907
Le Chroniqueur	Cantonal library of Fribourg	fr	1854	1881
Le Courrier fribourgeois	Cantonal library of Fribourg	fr	1830	1830
Le Narrateur fribourgeois	Cantonal library of Fribourg	fr	1840	1855
La Tribune de Fribourg	Cantonal library of Fribourg	fr	1905	2018
Le Véridique	Cantonal library of Fribourg	fr	1831	1833
L’Express	Public and university library of Neuchâtel (BPUN) / ArcInfo	fr	1738	2018
L’Impartial	Public and university library of Neuchâtel (BPUN)  / ArcInfo	fr	1881	2018
L’Essor	Library of La Chaux-de-Fonds / L’Essor newspaper	fr	1906	2018
La Sentinelle - Le Peuple La Sentinelle	Library of La Chaux-de-Fonds / Socialist party of Neuchâtel	fr	1890	1971
Bulletin des séances de la Constituante	Valais media library	fr	1839	1839
Courrier du Valais	Valais media library	fr	1935	1938
L’Écho des Alpes	Valais media library	fr	1839	1844
Le Journal du Valais	Valais media library	fr	1848	1848
Confédéré	Valais media library	fr	1861	2018
L’Observateur	Valais media library	fr	1846	1848
Gazette de Lausanne	Le Temps newspaper	fr	1804	1991
Journal de Genève	Le Temps newspaper	fr	1826	1998
Le nouveau quotidien	Le Temps newspaper	fr	1991	1998
Neue Zürcher Zeitung	Neue Zürcher Zeitung newspaper	de	1780	2017

Le Temps and NZZ

Le Temps and Neue Zürcher Zeitung are among the major Swiss newspapers (for French and German-speaking parts of Switzerland, respectively) and both organizations accepted to support impresso. NZZ is the oldest newspaper in Switzerland, which has been published without interruption since 1780. Le Temps was born in 1998 (20th birthday this year), from the fusion of 2 existing newspapers: Le Journal de Genève published since 1826 and Le nouveau Quotidien since 1991, Le Journal de Genève having itself integrated La Gazette de Lausanne, published since 1804.

Luxembourgish newspapers

Title	Lg	From	To
L’Action féminine	de	1927	1940
Der Arme Teufel	fr de	1903	1929
L’avenir	fr de	1868	1871
Bulletin de la Société des naturalistes luxembourgeois	de	1907	2011
Bürger- und Beamten-Zeitung	de	1898	1916
Courrier du Grand-Duché de Luxembourg	fr de	1844	1868
De Letzeburger	de	1893	1909
De Mitock	fr de lb	1937	1940
Die Schmiede	de	1916	1919
Diekircher Wochenblatt	de	1841	1848
D’Lëtzebuerger Land	en fr de lb	1954	2007
D’Unio’n	lb	1944	1948
Jong-Hémecht	de	1926	1940
Komm mit mir!	de	1884	1884
La Gazette du Grand-Duché de Luxembourg	fr	1878	1878
Das Luxemburger Land in Wort und Bild	fr de	1895	1895
Luxemburger Volks-Freund	de	1869	1876
Luxemburger Wort	fr de lb	1848	1950
Luxemburger Zeitung	de	1844	1845
Luxemburger Zeitung = Journal de Luxembourg	de	1858	1859
Mittheilungen aus den Vereinssitzungen	de	1891	1906
Obermosel-Zeitung	de	1881	1948
Ons Jongen	lb	1944	1951
Recueil des mémoires et des travaux publiés par la Société Botanique du Grand-Duché de Luxembourg	fr	1874	1902
Tageblatt	fr de lb	1913	1950
L’Union	fr de	1860	1871
Der Wächter an der Sauer	de	1849	1869
D’Wäschfra	de	1868	1884

Dutch newspapers

Impresso also received the support from the National Library of the Netherlands, who accepted to share with us their newspaper archive in French language. Those newspapers will be processed from July 2018 on.

Title	Lg	From	To
Traduction libre des gazettes flamandes et autres	fr	1677	1677
Nouvelles extraordinaires de divers endroits	fr	1696	1798
Gazette de Rotterdam	fr	1690	1714
Avec privilège de nos-seigneurs les Etats de Hollande et de West-Frise	fr	1696	1740
Journal d’Amsterdam	fr	1783	1783
Nouvelles politiques publiées à Leyde	fr	1798	1804
Courrier d’Amsterdam = Courier van Amsterdam	du fr	1810	1811
Journal du département des bouches du Rhin	du fr	1810	1813
Gazette de Frise = Vriesche courant	du fr	1811	1811
Gazette de Groningue = Groninger courant	du fr	1811	1811
Feuille politique du département du Zuiderzee = Staatkundig dagblad van het Departement der Zuiderzee	du fr	1811	1813
Feuille politique du département de l’Issel-supérieur = Staatkundig dagblad van het departement van den Boven-IJssel	du fr	1812	1813
Affiches annonces et avis divers d’Amsterdam = Advertentiën aankondigingen en verschillende berigten van Amsterdam	du fr	1811	1813
Feuille d’affiches annonces et avis divers de Groningue = Advertentieblad bekendmakingen en onderscheidene berigten van Groningen	du fr	1812	1813
Journal du département des bouches de l’Escaut = Dagblad van het departement van de Schelde	du fr	1811	1814
Affiches annonces et avis divers de Leyde = Advertentiën aankondigingen en berigten van Leyden	du fr	1812	1813
Java government gazette	du en	1812	1816
Journal de la province de Limbourg	fr	1816	1829
L’éclaireur : journal politique commercial et littéraire de Maestricht	fr	1827	1829
L’éclaireur politique : journal de la province du Limbourg	fr	1829	1830
Journal de La Haye	fr	1830	1849
Affiches annonces et avis divers de Rotterdam = Advertentien aankondigingen en berigten van Rotterdam	du fr	1812	1813
Gazette d’Amsterdam = Amsterdamsche courant	du fr	1811	1811
Gazette de Leuwarde = Leeuwarder courant	du fr	1811	1811
Gazette de Middelbourg = Middelburgsche courant	du fr	1811	1811
Gazette du département de l’Ems occidental = Courant van het departement van de Wester Eems	du fr	1811	1811
Gazette d’Utrecht = Utrechtsche courant	du fr	1748	1811
Journal du département de la Frise = Dagblad van het departement Vriesland	du fr	1811	1813
Journal historique	fr	1704	1712
Memoires qui doivent servir à la composition de la Gazette d’Amsterdam	fr	1671	1675
Moniteur d’Amsterdam = Moniteur van Amsterdam	du fr	1810	1810
Nouvelles de divers quartiers	fr	1714	1714
Suite des nouvelles d’Amsterdam	fr	1707	1740

What’s next

We keep getting into contact with institutions at Swiss and European level and other collections will complement the current set, first on the list being Belgium and remaining Swiss newspapers.

Thanks

We are very grateful to all institutions who accepted to share their collections.