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We are delighted to feature a guest post this week by Peter Manning, who used The Archive to research his new book Palace at the Palace – A History of The Crystal Palace & Its Football Club 1851-1915.My project started out as research into the Crystal Palace football teams that played at the old Crystal Palace at Sydenham, but the history that was revealed by searching the BNA’s archives was so interesting and so compelling that I ended up writing a book…

One of the features of The British Newspaper Archive is the OCR editing tool.  This allows every user to contribute to the improvement of The Archive.  OCR stands for Optical Character Recognition– the process we use to transform millions of digitised images into searchable text.   The computer takes an image of the page and then turns each line into text.  However, as many of us have encountered, the text is not always correct and needs improvement.  As a group, we…

The Illustrated London News, the world’s first illustrated newspaper, debuted in 1842.  Over the decades, the publishers expanded into the ‘great 8’ titles: Sketch, Sphere, Tatler, Graphic, Bystander, Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, and Britannia and Eve.  In 1928, the Illustrated London News published an illustration of the interior of their own offices at Inveresk House, ‘a hive of journalistic industry’.Discover more about the history of the Illustrated London NewsIn the image, you can see the offices of the individual editors…

Throughout the month of October, The British Newspaper Archive will take a closer look at stories of crime, courts, and punishment in the papers.  We have pulled together some headlines from the month of October including a riot, a case of arsenic poisoning, a couple of London’s notorious criminals, and a political crime.Register now!4 October 1936The Battle of Cable Street took place in London’s East End on the day of a scheduled march by Oswald Mosley’s right wing organisation…

This week The British Newspaper Archive is thrilled to announce the release of a brand new title, The Atlas or, in its full form, The Atlas and General Newspaper and Journal of Literature.  The size of the paper caused a sensation when it first came out.  The London based newspapers was printed on 40cm sheets, double the size of average papers, making it the largest newspaper.  Its size was reflected in the price of 10d, which would be close to £5…

London is steeped in rich history. Every borough, street and building in the UK’s capital city has a past and the British Newspaper Archive is one of the best resources available for unlocking the stories behind them. No matter what part of London you’re interested in researching, you’ll find newspapers covering every locality, with contemporary reports from some of the most pivotal eras in British history.Register now and view London newspapers for FREEOne of the quickest ways to…

We have all fallen victim to superstitions.  I avoid walking under ladders, never open an umbrella indoors, and dread spilling salt at the table.  Even Napoleon was influenced by superstitions.  Once when he was separated from his beloved Josephine, a picture of her fell over, and with haste, Napoleon sent a message to Josephine to make sure she was well.  A look through The British Newspaper Archive proves that people of all walks of life have been touched by fear…

While researching A Visitor’s Guide to Jane Austen’s England, author Sue Wilkes discovered an amazing romance which could have appeared in an Austen novel. We love hearing about what you’re finding in the newspapers. Tell us about your own discoveries in the comments section below. ************** Heiress Augusta Nicholson, a most intrepid young lady, showed great ingenuity when she fell in love with handsome John Giles, a penniless comedian.Miss Nicholson was a ward of chancery and would inherit £14,000 when she…

The first person to be arrested and charged for driving under the influence of alcohol was George Smith, a London cabdriver.Charged with drunk driving on 10 September 1897This article from the Morning Post reported that at about 00:45 on Friday 10 September 1897, Smith’s vehicle ‘swerved from one side of the road to the other, and ran across the footway into 165 New Bond Street’.George Smith admitted that he’d had ‘two or three glasses of beer’ and apologised, stating that ‘it is the…

Mrs Caudle first appeared as a character in Punch magazine in 1845. She was portrayed as the archetypal nagging wife, always telling her husband off for something.The West Kent Guardian reveals the real Mrs CaudleThis article from the West Kent Guardian reveals that the real-life Mrs Caudle was also a woman not to be messed with. The newspaper published the following court report on Saturday 26 July 1845.West Kent Guardian – Saturday 26 July 1845Image © THE BRITISH LIBRARY BOARD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.…