Does anyone know what the newspaper was in Orange Co. about 1830/36?
Does any library have copies?
There were three papers published intermittently during this period of time.
They were broadsheet style papers and probably do not exist even in an
archive. It wasn't until 1839 with the printing of the True American that
Orange County actually had anything that could today be related to a
newspaper.
The True American, published by Henry Commingore, actually contains little
local news. With the exception of the one line death notices and occasional
article, most of the local interest is contained in the advertisements. As
the County paper of circulation, it was in the ad section where notices of
legal actions were published. Most of the articles in the paper were
actually just reprints of articles from other papers, which was the common
publishing style of that day, before the UPI and AP wire services. It's a
little disappointing if you're looking for local news.
There is a wonderful collection of microfilm of Orange County newspapers,
available for purchase or interlibrary loan, from the Indiana Historical
Society. Orange County is fortunate in that our population was highly
literate and newspapers flourished in Paoli, Orleans and French Lick. I
recently purchased 50 reels of microfilm for a new Orange County project I
am working on (Spring Valley Families of the early 20th century) and I am
very pleased with the quality of these films. The address of these films can
be found at:
http://www.indianahistory.org/micro.htm
Tom Agan