Gilroy
– The public can now learn about Gilroy’s past as if it were
taking place today.
The Gilroy Historical Society recently presented City Council
with the culmination of its Newspaper Preservation Project, a
three-year effort to capture the history of Gilroy on
microfilm.
Gilroy – The public can now learn about Gilroy’s past as if it were taking place today.
The Gilroy Historical Society recently presented City Council with the culmination of its Newspaper Preservation Project, a three-year effort to capture the history of Gilroy on microfilm.
In conjunction with the Gilroy Historical Museum, the society was able to purchase the last piece of the project’s puzzle: a new Minolta scanner and laser printer.
Now, museum visitors can look up archived newspapers on a computer using the microfilm and reader, then print or e-mail the records.
The equipment was installed in the museum last week, said historical society president Connie Rogers, and was presented to City Council at a Monday night meeting.
The city owns and operates the museum and will provide $986 annually for the project’s maintenance.
“This will truly be a great research source for scholars and genealogists,” Rogers said. “We’re so excited … (The society’s) theme is building community through history, and we think this accomplishes that.”
The new equipment totaled $8,250 and was paid for through a variety of grants and donations including $3,000 from Calpine Energy, $2,500 from the Gilroy Foundation, $2,000 from the Rotary Club, $650 from the sale of author Claudia Salewske’s “Images of America” and $500 from society fundraisers.
The society launched the project in 2001 when a member of the historical society was researching her family history and noticed that original printed copies of the Gilroy Advocate, the Gilroy Evening Dispatch and the Gilroy Dispatch were in poor condition.
The 262 rolls of microfilm, purchased in July 2003, cost $7,000 and were purchased by grants and donations from the George White Memorial Fund, Daughters of the American Revolution, society savings and fundraisers, and portions of Salewske’s book sales, Rogers said.
Storing newspapers on microfilm largely overcomes challenges posed by storing the printed version, Rogers said, such as adequate storage space, page fragility and limited portability.
The microfilm contains copies of Gilroy newspapers dating back to 1848 and depicts the changing lifestyles, issues, social history and politics of Gilroy throughout the late 19th century and into the 20th century.
The Gilroy Advocate was the city’s first newspaper, published from 1868 through 1938 and a couple of years in the 1940s. The Gilroy Evening Dispatch began publishing in 1925 and became The Gilroy Dispatch about 20 years later.
The museum also keeps bound copies of the printed newspapers for public viewing.
“On behalf of the city, I want to thank you for all the hard work you’ve put into this project,” said Mayor Al Pinheiro. “This is a great thing for the city.”
To purchase the microfilm, the society contacted the California Newspaper Project, a preservation group based at the University of California at Riverside. The company that used to make and store archived newspapers on microfilm for The Dispatch disappeared in 1999, apparently selling many of the microfilms to a private collector who then sold them to CNP.
BMI Imaging, the company that now makes and stores the archived papers, acquired the microfilms and made copies for the project. BMI made an offer to the Gilroy Historical Society and the Gilroy Public Library to buy copies of the microfilm at the CNP price of $25 per roll, instead of the normal $110 per roll.
