At no cost to the Pilot Point taxpayers, the Post-Signal archives from 1967 to 2015 will be preserved as part of the University of North Texas Digital Newspaper project.
Pilot Point Community Library Director Jenna Glass got the news about the Ladd and Katherine Hancher Library Foundation grant of $20,000 in late October.
'I don't know if people realize how much information they will have access to once it's digitized,' Glass said. 'It's going to be a huge chunk of local history that's easily searchable now, so I'm very excited.'
The grant will cover 100% of the project, which is estimated to be done in March.
'It's fantastic that the organization is willing to fund grants like this,' Bardwell said.
Glass worked with Post-Signal Editor and Publisher Abigail Bardwell as well as the Digital Newspaper Program Director Ana Krahmer to submit the grant paperwork.
'I feel like it's UNT doing all the legwork,' Glass said.
Krahmer disagreed. '[Jenna] did the heavy lifting,' she said. '[Abigail] and [Jenna] both.'
Bardwell and Krahmer first discussed the ability to back up the archives of the paper digitally in January of 2020, when they met at the Texas Press Association convention in Galveston.
More than five years later, it's becoming a reality thanks to Glass' efforts.
'Jenna is a librarian of the future and somebody I would really like continue to give her expertise and knowledge and willingness to support the community in Pilot Point, and I wish that we could clone her,” Krahmer said. 'Just talking to her, I could tell how important it is to her to offer modern resources to her community.'
For both Krahmer and Glass, it will provide broader and easier access to the historical record of the area.
'The newspaper issues that we have are heavily used, and I know that researchers who have done a lot of work on Denton County and some lost history, even, will appreciate being able to access these new newspaper issues,' Krahmer said.
For Bardwell, having the digital copies of the physical papers feels reassuring that the copies will not be endangered by natural disasters or a fire.
'Having that backup makes it so we won't lose the history if we physically lose the copies, which is important,' she said.
She's also grateful that having the library's copies of the paper used as the archival copies means the bound books the paper has on site can remain intact instead of having to be split apart.
'It lines up perfectly with what we have that we would have had to dismantle,' Bardwell said. '… I very much appreciate the library putting in this work to be able to preserve it this way, because this means that the bound copies that we have, which are our archival books, do not have to be destroyed and taken apart to preserve this history, which is fantastic.'
For Glass, Krahmer and Bardwell, having the local history preserved means so much.
'In the past, if you wanted to research a local obituary or news story, … you'd have to come in person to the library [or Post-Signal office], which is not always possible for everyone because we're not open 24/7,' Glass said. '… And then physically search through the papers. You would also need to know what year you're looking for, what month you're looking for. There's not really a way to search beyond that.'
Now, everything will be searchable via keywords or date ranges.
'I can't even begin to tell you how valuable preserving our free press is, and how valuable it is to have the local community identity freely available and preserved, because without that, you lose people's voices over time,' Krahmer said. 'And the newspapers represent the individual perspectives on world views but in a small community. You're not going to get that same perspective from the Dallas Morning News.'
She expressed her gratitude to the foundations that value such preservation work, including the Hancher Library Foundation.
To explore the UNT Digital Newspaper project, visit texashistory.unt.edu/explore/ collections/TDNP.
Glass also said to watch for an event in the spring to walk library patrons to search through the Portal to Texas History once the archives are available online.
