Readex Announces Completion of American Broadsides and Ephemera

[Loiterstein, David]

Readex Announces Completion of Digital American Broadsides and Ephemera,
Series I

Available Now, Newest Archive of Americana Collection Vividly Captures
Daily Lives of 19th-Century Americans 

Readex, a leading publisher of online historical collections, announced
that it has completed the digital edition of American Broadsides and
Ephemera, Series I, 1760-1900. It offers full-color, fully searchable
facsimile images of approximately 15,000 broadsides printed between 1820
and 1900 and 15,000 pieces of ephemera printed between 1760 and 1900.
Based on the landmark collections of broadsides and ephemera held by the
American Antiquarian Society (AAS), this digital edition, published in
cooperation with the AAS, is part of Readex's acclaimed Web-based
Archive of Americana. 

Available now, American Broadsides and Ephemera, Series I, 1760-1900
enables students and scholars to explore hundreds of specific subjects
in American history by easily searching and browsing high-resolution
facsimiles of approximately 30,000 rare and often graphically stunning
primary materials. Created in response to popular topics and issued
locally, most broadsides and ephemera were not preserved. However, those
that survive today offer an invaluable perspective on many aspects of
American culture between 1760 and 1900. Major subjects covered include
customs and manners, economics and trade, government, health, law and
crime, military, peoples, philosophy, politics, religion, science and
society. 

"As AAS librarian Samuel Foster Haven noted more than 100 years ago,"
said Georgia B. Barnhill, Andrew W. Mellon Curator of Graphic Arts at
the American Antiquarian Society, "Broadsides and ephemera 'imply a vast
deal more than they literally express, and disclose visions of interior
conditions of society such as cannot be found in formal narratives.'" 

"Last fall, the launch of American Broadsides and Ephemera helped mark
the anniversary of Readex's storied 50-year partnership with the AAS,"
said Remmel Nunn, Readex Vice President of New Product Development. "The
completion of this unique digital edition is proof positive of Readex's
equally enduring commitment to providing authoritative primary source
collections based on the best bibliographic controls and the nation's
finest print holdings of American historical documents." 

Readex's digital edition of American Broadsides and Ephemera can be
cross-searched with all other collections in the Web-based Archive of
Americana, which features more than 1,000 newspapers, 100,000 books and
seminal collections of government documents printed between 1639 and the
late 20th century. 

For more information on the digital edition of American Broadsides and
Ephemera, the Archive of Americana or other Readex products, visit
www.readex.com. 

About the American Antiquarian Society
Founded in 1812 as the country's first national historical organization,
the American Antiquarian Society is both a learned society and a major
independent research library. The AAS library today houses the largest
and most accessible collection of books, pamphlets, broadsides,
newspapers, periodicals, sheet music, and graphic arts material printed
through 1876 in what is now the United States, as well as manuscripts
and a substantial collection of secondary works, bibliographies, and
other reference works related to all aspects of American history and
culture before the twentieth century. The Society sponsors a broad range
of programs-visiting research fellowships, research, education,
publications, lectures, and concerts-for constituencies ranging from
school children and their teachers through undergraduate and graduate
students, postdoctoral scholars, creative and performing artists and
writers, and the general public. 

About Readex
For more than 50 years, the Readex name has been synonymous with
research in historical printed materials and government documents.
Recognized by librarians, students and scholars for its efforts to
transform academic research, Readex offers a wealth of Web-based,
primary source materials in the humanities and social sciences. Today,
Readex, a division of NewsBank, inc., has established a leadership
position among publishers by creating the digital Archive of Americana,
a family of online collections that provides unprecedented access to the
history, culture and daily life of the United States over more than
three centuries. 

# # # 

David G. Loiterstein
Marketing Manager
Readex
phone: 203.421.0152
e-mail: dloiterstein at readex.com
www.readex.com

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org