Researchers at the University of Toronto are providing valuable insight into Canadian history by creating an accessible, free database of the nation’s first newspapers.

The front page of issue No. 1 of Le Canadien, which was published November 22, 1806 (image via U of T Scarborough Library)

Led by Sébastien Drouin, an associate professor in the department of language studies at U of T Scarborough, the bilingual project, “Early Modern Canadian Newspapers Online” is a collection of newspapers from the second half of the eighteenth century – from 1752 to 1810 – printed in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Québec and Ontario.

“There are libraries at other universities that have started some digitization of Canadian newspapers, but there are no other projects right now dedicated to early modern Canadian newspapers,” says Drouin, an expert in early modern clandestine literature and early modern journalism.

“We’re very excited about giving access to documents that are almost impossible to find right now.”

You can read a lot more in an article in the University of Toronto web site at: https://bit.ly/3RJ70A9.