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Newsclippings books

Description

Unique IDAS-1157Start dateBetween 1st May 1906 and 1st February 1980Start date qualifiercircaFormatVolume - HardcoverDescriptionThis series contains a collection of news clipping books devoted specifically to nostalgic reminiscences of “old times” in Sydney. As this collection predates the establishment of the Sydney Municipal Library, the early clippings in this series may have come from the NSW Government's Free Public Library's Newspaper Room (situated on the second floor of the QVB) which the Council Library inherited at its inception in 1909. The 1910 Librarian's Annual Report states that a total of 272,680 patrons visited the Newspaper Room during that year (1). In regards to newspapers available to the patrons, the 1936 Annual Report reports that '351 newspapers and journals are received regularly and made available to the Public'(2). The City Librarian doesn't refer to the clipping of newspaper articles until the 1940 Annual Report which states that the newsclippings have 'been found of great value during the year and it is felt that the information available in these files about the history of Sydney forms a valuable supplement to that available on the same subject in the Mitchell Library' (3). From the 1940 through to the 1950s, there is a separate section in the Annual Reports dedicated to the Newspaper Room activities and often mentions the clippings. By 1955, the City Librarian reports that 'Local history students are served by means of a pressing clippings file, now numbering 64 volumes, which is indexed on 46,000 cards' (4). The Library continued to have the Newspaper room until the Central Library moved to Pitt Street in 1983. This news clipping collection was transferred to Archives from the City Library in 1997.

There are three sequences of news clipping books in this series (which are different from the news clipping books records series catalogued mostly at clipping level in Archives Investigator – CRS 759 and CRS 1083 for example). The three sequences of clippings books are: Australiana; Old Sydney; and Peeps from the Past. Each sequence is discussed in details below.

Australiana: This is by far the largest of the sequences. The volumes in this sequence have alphabetical identification codes on the spines. Although primarily consisting of clippings devoted specifically to historical reminisces of Sydney and New South Wales, the volumes also contain clippings of contemporary news that possibly were thought to be of historical interest. These clippings take up the bulk of the later volumes covering the 1960s and 1970s, as well as volume JJ covering 1939-1940.

•A – Z (clippings date from May 1906 to October 1925). Volume ‘V’ is a special book on “Australian pioneers”

•AA – UU (there is no volume II) (clippings date from August 1918 to March 1977. Volume LL is clippings about the City Library. The card index seems to extend only about as far as volume KK, leaving LL – UU unindexed.

•Two other volumes cover the period April 1977 into 1978. Not indexed.

•There are also two other volumes of clippings on libraries and librarianship generally, including the City Library, covering the periods (1) September 1910 to August 1920, and (2) March 1970 to February 1980. Not indexed.

The original handwritten index cards for this sequence have been partially replaced by typed cards.

The index is subject based, with alpha-numeric references to volume and page numbers. For example “D168” is a reference to Volume D page 168.

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Old Sydney: “Old Sydney” is the name of a long running newspaper section written by “Old Chum”, assumed to be the pseudonym of J.M. Forde. The set of numbers on each spine represent the articles series numbers. There are two runs of volumes –

•This set has the attribution “J M Forde” on the spine of each volume, in addition to an alphabetical volume identification and a set of numbers, as follows –
B 176-316
C 317-484
D 485-618
E 619-850
F 851-1089

The significance of the numbers is unknown, they are not page numbers as each volume is separately paginated starting with page 1.

These five volumes cover the period February 1911 to October 1928.

The index cards are subject based and (as with the Australiana set) have alpha numeric references indicating volume and page numbers.

•In addition there are two more volumes, which do not seem to be indexed –

OS1 – covering the period November 1915 to January 1924 and also 1949-1953.
OS2 – covering March 1953 to February 1959

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Peeps at the Past

This sequences comprises six volumes labelled as follows –

1Old times
1APeeps at the past
2Looking backward
3Peeps at the past
4Peeps at the past
5Peeps at the past

They cover the period November 1909 to July 1922.

The card index for this sequence has references in the form 1p64 (where 1 is the volume and 64 is the page number.

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References:
CRS 42 Annual Reports of the City Libarian 1909 - 1955
(1) 1910 Annual Report
(2) 1936 Annual Report
(3) 1940 Annual Report
(4) 1955 Annual Report
Start Date qual: by
Start Date: 01/05/1906
End Date qual: later than
End Date: 01/02/1980LanguageEnglish (eng)

Access

Public access noteAccess Notes:
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Identification and Arrangement

Source system ID1157System of arrangementVarious - See Descriptive Note

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Newsclippings books