Times Online!
The Times of London recently made its 200-year archive available at the Times Archives.
The presentation is very user-friendly: you can use the site search functionality, of course, but you can also click on a scrolling timeline, which allows you to browse for something that may be of interest. As a historical novelist myself, I’m very excited about the potential here, both for research and also — frankly — for trolling for ideas!
You’ll also see a separate photograph archive, some featured articles, the ability to do a single-day search (along the lines of “this day in history”), and Times recommendations.
Why am I so excited? After all, the History Channel’s been offering something similar on its site for years.
The point is that this is primary source material. It’s not someone’s account of what may have happened, it’s what the newspaper reported happening. Authentic, not too biased (no reports are completely unbiased), and arranged in such a way that the user can get information quickly and easily.
Note that there is currently a free introductory period for use of the archives; it’s unclear what the cost will be later on down the line, but it’s sure to be well worth it to those of us needing the resource. It has my vote for Site of the Month, that’s for sure! Check it out yourself, and you’ll be … beyond the elements of style!
ADDENDUM: My colleague and friend Dick Margulis (he of Ampers&Virgule fame) has helpfully noted that “The date widget is day-month-year rather than the American-style month-day-year. So if someone is looking for news on a particular date, they should be careful to enter it in the right order.”
(You can tell that he’s beyond the elements of style!) Thank you, Dick!