WELCOME TO THE HANDWRITTEN NEWSPAPERS PROJECT
Handwritten newspapers and news sheets have been published all over the world from antiquity to today. They embody the universal journalistic impulse to share news and information with others through the best medium at hand, often under adverse conditions and with limited resources. This online collection documents the long legacy of manuscript news and story telling around the world. Welcome and enjoy exploring the collection.
The Handwritten Newspapers Project is an online collection of manuscript newspapers and publications from around the world. The entries for these rare handwritten publications contain bibliographical data, images, resource links, and research notes for each entry.
A majority of the handwritten publications compiled here are from North America, particularly the United States and Canada. Most were published in the 19th century. However, the collection also includes works from elsewhere around the world. It even includes some produced on ships at sea, in prison camps, and beyond. They date from the ancient world (Imperial Rome’s Acta Diurna) to the present day. The Japanese handwritten newspaper published March 2011 after that nation’s devastating earthquake and tsunami, an Urdu language paper in India handwritten since 1927, and Liberia’s Daily Talk, a chalkboard “paper” posted on a blackboard on busy downtown street in Monrovia, the African nation’s capital city since 2000, are just a few examples of those published in our own day.
The manuscripts included in this online collection are identified by title, place of origin, and dates of publication, if known. Each bibliographic entry is divided into three sections containing a publication history, a general overview with the project editor’s notes based on a review of the available documentary evidence, information on the publication’s known bibliographic resources, and the archival location(s) of extant copies. When available, an image of an extant copy of the publication has been included. All entries containing images are indexed (or in process).
In the right column on every webpage is the site index that allows users to explore the collection by key categories: date, alphabetical order, country and/or state/province of origin (if known), and/or type of publication, as categorized by the project’s editorial criteria. These categories have been applied to each publication to allow users to sort through or group related or similar manuscripts as desired. Tabs for “Recent” and “Pending” pages list the “new” titles that have recently become available, or haven’t yet been fully vetted or cataloged.
Welcome, Explore, and Enjoy
Welcome to The Handwritten Newspapers Project. If you know of any handwritten publications not included in this collection, or you can provide additional or corrective information for the bibliographical entries below, please send them along to the editor. We invite your comments and feedback about individual entries or the site as a whole. Remarkably, we even accept handwritten letters and cards!!
Thanks. Welcome. Explore. Enjoy.
Handwritten Newspapers Project|
Published, June 21, 2011
[Last Update: Lent, February 23, 2026]
The Handwritten Newspapers Project 