Skip to Main Content

Retrieving Newspaper Articles for Law Review Research

This guide explains the resources available at BC Law Library for retrieving newspaper articles needed for law review research.

Tracking local newspapers

 Locating a local newspaper

  • The Library of Congress offers an index of U.S. Newspapers published from 1690 to the present.  This directory helps users determine which newspapers were published in certain communities in a certain time period.  Only a selection of these newspapers are available in digital format.
  • LexisNexis Academic features a "Small Town Papers" segment within its News search.

Locating regional and local newspapers

It can be very difficult to locate print versions of regional and local newspapers.  Here is the best process to verify the citation for your cite-checking assignment:

1) Search the BC Libraries Catalog, to see if the newspaper is owned by Boston College. If the BC libraries own the paper, there may be backfiles in print or in microfilm/microfiche format. Click the "Find it in Library" link within the record to see more details.

2) If the newspaper is not owned by Boston College, search the WorldCat database. If the author cited a print version of the newspaper, and the newspaper is not owned by BC libraries, then you may have to request the article on interlibrary loan.  Worldcat will allow you to verify the title and publication information for the newspaper and view which libraries own the newspaper.

Finding historic U.S. newspapers

The Library of Congress runs Chronicling America, an ongoing effort to create a searchable database of American newspapers.  The program provides images of historic pages/dates from 1836-1922.  The files are available in PDF format.