Cobb Public Libraries highlight the expansion of the Georgia Historic Newspapers digital collection

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a drawing of a newspaper

Posted By: Larry Felton Johnson August 9, 2024

Regular readers of the Cobb County Courier know that we often heavily use the Georgia Historic Newspapers website as a source for our history articles. 

Examples of our articles that came directly from research in that wonderful database include this article about a serious train wreck in Powder Springs in 1907, an article about Smyrna’s thriving poultry industry in 1911, and a bizarre 1914 car chase in which two bandits were captured in Mableton.  

There are a lot of others, and you can find them by browsing these search results from the Courier.

Cobb County Public Library recently posted an announcement about an expansion of the selection of digital and online historic Georgia newspapers.

According to the news release:

Georgia Public Library Service (GPLS), in partnership with public libraries statewide, has completed the digitization of over 46,000 pages of newspapers from 1907-1972, which can be accessed for free through the Georgia Historic Newspaper (GHN) archive …

This digitization is part of a larger effort to improve access to a more comprehensive selection of Georgia’s historical and cultural newspapers, after Georgia Public Library Service discovered the Clayton County Library System and 19 counties in the state did not have any digitized newspapers. Since 2006, Georgia’s public libraries have funded over 1.1 million of the 2.4 million pages of digitized content in the Georgia Historic Newspapers portal. 

“Each year at Georgia Public Library Service, we fill historical gaps in our state’s story,” said Josh Kitchens, director of Archival Services and Digital Initiatives at GPLS. “With the digitization of these materials, all library systems and five new counties are now represented in the Georgia Historic Newspaper project.”

Below is a list of the newly digitized newspaper titles, the date range of available issues, and a link to the collection:

“Preserving our local history is a core mission of the Clayton County Library System. We are grateful for Georgia Public Library Service’s support in this project to make our local history accessible to all,” said Scott Parham, director of Clayton County Library System in the news release.

About the Cobb County Public Library

According to the Cobb County Public Library website:

Cobb County Public Library is a 15-branch system headquartered in Marietta, Georgia, where its staff members serve a diverse population of over 750,000 people. Cobb is one of Georgia’s fastest-growing counties, and Cobb County Public Library is dedicated to being a resource center in the community by providing equal access to information, materials, and services.

History of Cobb’s library system

The first public library in Cobb County was opened in the home of Sarah Freeman Clarke in Marietta. Clarke, whose family was from Massachusetts, was an advocate for free lending libraries and began lending books from her own collection informally from her house before it became obvious there needed to be a better-organized library system.

According to The First Hundred Years, A Short History of Cobb County in Georgia, by Sarah Blackwell Gober Temple, the library opened in 1882, was at Clarke’s residence on Whitlock Avenue, and was named the Franklin Library.

The first standalone library building opened on Church Street near the home of William Root in October 1893 and was named the Sarah Freeman Clarke Library.

Subsequently, libraries were opened in Acworth and Austell. In 1959, the city of Marietta and several other Cobb County libraries combined to form a countywide system that began the Cobb County Public Library as we know it today.

You can read more about the history of the Cobb County Public Library by following this link.