Kottke's gems from the NYT archives

Jason Kottke is going archive crazy with the New York Times. The Times dropped the paywall that locked non-subscribers out of its archives last week, and at the time, they noted that they hoped that this would inspire bloggers and others to go mining through the incredibly rich corpus of news and stories stretching back through the past two centuries. Kottke's certainly turned up some gems, but there's plenty more to be had -- post your finds in the comments!

- The first mention of the World Wide Web in the Times in February 1993. According to the article, the purpose of the web is "[to make] available physicists' research from many locations". Also notable are this John Markoff article on the internet being overwhelmed by heavy traffic and growth...in 1993, and a piece, also by Markoff, on the Mosaic web browser.

- Early report of Lincoln's assassination..."The President Still Alive at Last Accounts".

- A report on Custer's Last Stand a couple of weeks after the occurance (I couldn't find anything sooner). The coverage of Native Americans is notable for the racism, both thinly veiled and overt, displayed in the writing, e.g. a story from September 1872 titled The Hostile Savages.

- From the first year of publication, a listing of the principle events of 1851.

- An article about the confirmation of Einstein's theory of gravity by a 1919 expedition led by Arthur Eddington to measure the bending of starlight by the sun during an eclipse.

Link

See also: NYTimes kills its paywall: "Google visitors make more dough than subscribers"

[#1 posted by Anonymous , September 20, 2007 2:49 AM]

While it's great that the New York Times as put this material on-line in such an easily-accessible manner, anyone with a New York Public Library card (or Boston P.L. - or one from any other decent library) has had *free* electronic access to the entire run of the NYT (1851-2003) on-line for years. The Boston P.L. also provides access to the Boston Globe and journals such as Science, Nature, Scientific American, The Atlantic Monthly and many hundreds of scholarly journals and historic newspapers for only the cost of a library card. The New York Public library has an even greater selection.

It's really incredible how much material is available.

It's one of the most under appreciated aspects of having a library card to one of these institutions.

[#2 posted by Dale Cruse , September 20, 2007 4:18 AM]

Kottke rocks.

[#3 posted by Anonymous , September 20, 2007 6:43 AM]

If the articles from 1851-1922 are in the public domain, why is the Times putting a (c) at the bottom of each .PDF?

For example,

Published: April 15, 1865
Copyright © The New York Times

[#4 posted by AaronZ , September 20, 2007 7:27 AM]

"The Hostile Savages." Isn't this how Fox News describes the 'liberal media'?
In a little over a century, some people's narrowmindedness doesn't change, just the targets.

[#5 posted by Anonymous , September 20, 2007 7:33 AM]

White Star Lines Announces construction of "unnamed" 1,000 ft. ship.

http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9E05EED6173EE233A25756C1A9659C946997D6CF&oref=slogin

[#6 posted by Stacyj , September 20, 2007 7:46 AM]

I love the early/mid 90s articles when the internet was still so new and arcane to the public at large - like this one, which discusses the growing "prestige" of those strange things called "email addresses" and how they'd gone from being seen as "arcane computer language" (why the heck does that "a" have a circle around it?? WHY??) to the mark of the "card-carrying member of the information age" ...

[#7 posted by rrsafety , September 20, 2007 8:06 AM]

The first mention of the Adolph Hitler. 1922. Rumor of Henry Ford Financing Bavarian Anti-Semite

[#8 posted by Hunty , September 20, 2007 8:24 AM]

The Great San Francisco Earthquake article is very interesting, especially for its shades of New Orleans a HUNDRED years later:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9C06E7DA113EE733A2575AC1A9629C946797D6CF

[#9 posted by rrsafety , September 20, 2007 8:43 AM]

Review of Darwin's Origin of Species. 1860. NY Times reviewer "remains unconvinced" but recognizes that the book builds a mighty "foundation" to change philosophic thought.

[#10 posted by Anonymous , September 20, 2007 11:16 AM]

I am confused. I tried searching thru the archives and only some of the articles are free, some are $3.95. Try searching "Charles Manson." $3.95.

[#11 posted by jphilby , September 20, 2007 2:44 PM]

Killed the paywall? I typed in "Savio" and got a pageful of PDFs for sale. WTF?

[#12 posted by kenspeckledotnet , September 20, 2007 6:40 PM]

Deeplinking has some good finds too, mostly early 20th century stuff on topics like cubism, vorticism (which the Times calls "the reductio ad absurdum of mad modernity"), and Oscar Wilde.

[#13 posted by GRFrench , September 20, 2007 7:52 PM]

The internet is described as "a here-and-now precursor to the interactive 500-channel cable television systems of the future." This comparison seems so silly to me, knowing the relationship at this point (who gives a crap about cable?).

[#14 posted by Jack Zero , September 20, 2007 8:06 PM]

jphilby, I was confused too. The NYT has opened the whole archive for searching, but searches only return title and first paragraph. They have also opened the archive from 1851 to 1922 and from 1987 to present for full viewing of articles. Some articles between 1922 and 1987 may be viewed freely, some have to be paid for. I haven't seen any explanation for why the 1922 to 1987 section hasn't been opened. Does anyone else know?