Newspaper Abstracts Update Finding Our Ancestors In The News! As we ring in the new year and look forward to finding those elusive ancestors, I would like to take a moment to look back on the past year and the happenings at NewspaperAbstracts.com. 2004 brought much needed improvements to the site and the way that news items are contributed, making it possible for news items to be online within minutes instead of weeks or months. No longer was it necessary for county and state coordinators to painstakingly hand-code and upload web pages, now it is being done by the simple use of an online form that allows coordinators to immediately post the news item to the site. We also welcomed dozens of new contributors and coordinators to our Newspaper Abstracts family and with their help grew by nearly 3,900 news items in a single year! There are now over 14,765 news items from all over the United States, Canada and Ireland, available free of charge on the http://www.NewspaperAbstracts.com website. I would like to take this time to publicly thank all of the county and state coordinators, along with the site contributors, for their dedication in consistently submitting news items to allow this site continue to grow and provide the visitors with such a wonderful resource. Without their generous donation of time and news items, Newspaper Abstracts would not have grown to be the wonderful resource that it is, and for that we are all very grateful. Call For Volunteers Are you looking for a project? Have a spare hour or two a week? We are always looking for volunteers to assist us with the site. While some counties and states have thousands of news items available, others are quite bare. Newspaper Abstracts is a personal site, run entirely by volunteers that relies on individuals like you to help it grow and continue to be such a wonderful free resource for researchers all over the world. There are many ways you can help: Transcribers – Don’t have any news items of your own to submit, but you would still like to help? Several coordinators have stacks of newspapers that need to be transcribed and submitted to the site. Coordinators are always looking for volunteers to help them transcribe copies of news items to be placed on the site. If you can help, please email [email protected] and a coordinator will contact you shortly with details. Contributors – Do you have news items that may be of benefit to others? Want a place to post them but don’t want to coordinate a county? Then this is for you! Request a free account (see below) and you can easily place your news items online and help other researchers in their search for their ancestors. County Coordinators – Do you have a county or two that you find yourself doing a lot of research in? As a county coordinator you can share your knowledge of the area and the news resources available to other researchers. Volunteer to coordinate a county (see below) and help it grow with news items. State Coordinator – Do you like to manage projects? Are you familiar with researching in a particular state? As a state coordinator you can help the site grow by submitting news items, assisting county coordinators and sharing your knowledge of news in your state with other researchers. If this sounds like you, volunteer to coordinate (see below) a state and meet thousands of helpful researchers in the process. Country Coordinator – Currently we have news items from the United States, Canada and Ireland. If you would be willing to take on another country and help it grow, email [email protected] and we can work out the details. To request a contributor account or to coordinate a county or state, complete the short form found at: http://www.newspaperabstracts.com/application.php Recent Additions to the following counties at http://www.NewspaperAbstracts.com Alaska - Fairbanks North Star, Outer Ketchikan Alabama – Washington Arizona – Yavapai California – Alameda, Contra Costa, Humboldt, Los Angeles, Marin, Mendocino, Modoc, Monterey, Napa, Sacramento, San Francisco, San Joaquin, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Shasta, Solano, Trinity, Tulare, Yolo, Yuba Canada - Nova Scotia, Ontario District of Columbia Iowa - Fremont, Polk Illinois - Adams, Brown, Champaign, Fulton, Logan, Morgan, Peoria, Pike, Sangamon, Schuyler, Tazewell Indiana - Floyd, Vigo Kansas - Greenwood, Shawnee Kentucky - Jefferson Massachusetts - Suffolk, Worcester Maryland - Frederick, Montgomery, Washington Missouri - Buchanan, Jefferson, Livingston Montana - Silver Bow New Mexico - Grant Nevada - Washoe New York - Brooklyn, Chemung, Erie, Genesee, Monroe, New York, Niagara Ohio - Ashtabula, Athens, Brown, Butler, Franklin, Harrison, Highland, Hocking, Holmes, Sandusky, Scioto, Seneca, Stark, Summit, Trumbull Oklahoma - Oklahoma, Tulsa, Woods Oregon - Wasco Pennsylvania - Adams, Bucks, Crawford, Philadelphia, Washington South Carolina - York Tennessee - Campbell, Carter, Knox, Sullivan Texas - Bexar, Harris, Shackelford, Throckmorton Virginia - Henrico, Warwick Vermont - Chittenden, Rutland, Washington, Windham Washington - Cowlitz, Lewis, Thurston Wisconsin - Dane, Dodge, Door, Iowa, Ozaukee, Sauk, Trempealeau, Walworth West Virginia – Mercer Have a Wonderful New Year, Barbara Freeman http://www.NewspaperAbstracts.com