Minnesota, U.S., Newspapers.com™ Stories and Events Index

General collection information

This index allows you to search for your ancestor by name in Minnesota newspapers that are available on Newspapers.com™ from the 1800s to the present. Not all newspapers from the state of Minnesota are included. Links to the newspaper article in which your ancestor's name was found are included in the index.

Using this collection

The index may include the following information:

Historic newspapers can offer a wealth of information to add to your family history. Newspapers publish birth, marriage, and death announcements that can provide the vital dates of your ancestor's life. All of these announcements also typically include information about your ancestor's family. Newspaper wedding reports and obituaries often provide more details than government or church records.

If your ancestor was a community leader, you may find their name in newspaper articles that describe the projects they were involved in. Even if your ancestor's name doesn’t appear in a newspaper, you could discover what life was like in their community during the time they lived there by reading newspaper articles.

Newspapers also published articles about negative events and difficult topics. You may find articles that state that your ancestors were victims of a crime, or that they committed a crime or were involved in a political scandal.

Collection in context

The newspapers that are included in this index were produced by journalists working throughout Minnesota. Newspapers are highly valuable primary historical sources, which contain the biases of the author. They also contain the terminology of the times and may include offensive or obsolete language. Newspapers typically provide the most depth and breadth of information that can be found about the community where they are published. Articles may show up across many sources and states if they were syndicated by groups like the Associated Press.

Newspapers in the United States were often published by political parties and mercantile enterprises until the 1830s, when entrepreneurs began publishing newspapers that they sold for a penny to mass audiences in large cities. The newspaper followed as the United States population grew and the country expanded west during the late 1800s. Between the 1850 and 1880 U.S. Censuses, the number of newspapers increased 350 percent, rising to more than 11,400 publications. From the late 1800s to the early 20th century, technology impacted newspaper production with faster presses, linotype machines that mechanized typesetting, and a process that allowed photographs to be printed.

The first newspaper in the Minnesota Territory, the Minnesota Pioneer, was published by James Madison Goodhue on April 28, 1849. Within two years, four other regularly published newspapers had joined the Pioneer to serve the territory's population of about 5,000 people.

Minnesota became the 32nd state to join the union in 1858, and the first daily newspaper, the Minneapolis Daily Tribune, began publication in 1867. That same year, the Minnesota Newspaper Association was founded to establish a set of standards and ethics for professional journalism in the state. In 1885, The Western Appeal became the state's first Black-owned newspaper. During the late 1800s and early 1900s, many ethnic newspapers were produced in the state to serve its Swedish, German, Danish, French, and Irish communities.

Bibliography

Fogarty, Billie Stone. "Finding & Using Historic Newspapers in Genealogical Research." Family Search. Accessed August 8, 2022. https://familysearch.brightspotcdn.com/3c/40/c9155b33c17a4e80fda5e2264765/course-handout.pdf.

Minnesota Newspaper Association. "About." Accessed August 8, 2022. https://mna.org/about/#.

The Family History Guide Blog. "Inside the Guide: Using Newspapers for Family History Research." Accessed August 8, 2022. https://www.thefhguide.com/blog/inside-the-guide-using-newspapers-for-family-history-research/.

Williamson, Lori. "First Minnesota Newspaper." Minnesota Historical Society. Accessed August 8, 2022. https://www.mnhs.org/blog/collectionsupclose/first-minnesota-newspaper#:~:text=On%20April%2028%2C%201849%20James,Pioneer%2C%22%20on%20this%20press.