It's been a year since the Boothbay Register, in partnership with Boothbay Region Historical Society (BRHS), began our digitization project. The goal is to create an easily searchable, electronic catalog of all 150 years of Register history, from 1876 to 2013 (after which the paper began creating E-editions).   

A small team of volunteers has been working at the Maine State Library in Augusta since last February, headed by project administrator Merritt Blakeslee and including Pat Brunell, Mari Tiwari, Karen Lukas, Robin Beck, Maggie Warren and Lisa Cocker. More volunteers are needed.   

Blakeslee said the team is about 46% of the way through and has scanned 61 out of the 137 total volumes. This leaves almost 4,000 weekly issues left to go.   

The later editions are more voluminous, but can be scanned more quickly because volunteers don’t have to spend time on repair work. In 1888, the Register changed hands from its founder, B.T. Cox, and switched its printing material from cotton paper to lower-quality acidic wood pulp paper. While the former has held up beautifully, large sections of the newspaper printed on the acidified paper are deteriorating, said Blakeslee.

“We've gone through yards and yards of mending tape. This stuff is so fragile that, if it's not already damaged, merely handling it risks further damage.”  

While all the volunteers spend time putting pieces back together, Mari Tiwari’s background in textile conservation has made her the de facto specialist. She estimated it takes about half an hour to get a damaged page into a scannable state. “I'm perfectly happy putting in a whole day on it, whereas I think that would drive most people a little nuts,” she said.  

Considering how much damage has already occurred and the short shelf life of acidified paper, Blakeslee emphasized how essential it is that the conservation is occurring now. He also highlighted Adam Fisher, director of Collections Development and Digital Initiatives at the Maine State Library, as a champion of the project.   

Fisher trained the team to use the library's state-of-the-art $60,000 scanner, allowed them to use the scanning laboratory and equipment when the library was still closed for renovations, and kept the project on track when the state library lost funding last year. It’s one of Fisher’s life missions to preserve as many local Maine newspapers as possible, according to Blakeslee.  

“(The newspapers are) invaluable records. Anybody who reads the Register today knows how much important minutia, how much of the vital stuff of daily life goes into each edition,” he said. According to Fisher, the Register is Maine's second-oldest weekly newspaper. 

It’s been interesting to see what's caught the attention of Tiwari and fellow volunteer Karen Lukas. This ranges from advertisements for strange health tonics, Mother’s Day Dinner specials for $3.75 and hardwood being sold for $7.50 per cord, to stories of sunken ships and ice harvesting, to personal history.   

“I found the obituary for the great aunt (Julia Schell) whose house I now live in,” said Lukas.   

Subscribers to the Register and members of BRHS will have access to the electronic Register upon completion. A reading room where bound copies can be reviewed will also be available at the Register’s office. 

For those interested in volunteering, a typical trip is a two-hour round commute to the Maine State Library in Augusta plus about six hours of scanning once a week. No experience is needed, as volunteers will be trained. Mileage and meals will be reimbursed at the standard federal business rate. Contact Blakeslee at (703) 869-3573.  

The Register is also seeking donations for its “Your History, Your Story” campaign. Names of project sponsors will be enshrined on the digital cover pages for each year starting in 1878. Lower-tier supporters will appear on the "Turn Of The Century" paper, and names will be listed alphabetically under the appropriate support level for the year 2000's cover page. Contact Sarah Morley at (207) 844-4630.  Donations can be mailed to the Boothbay Register, 97 Townsend Ave., Boothbay Harbor, ME 04538, or made online (https://www.boothbayregister.com/historic-digitizing)