Historical Bartlett Newspapers Preserved by UNT Libraries
DENTON (UNT), Texas -- Founded in 1881 when the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railway laid tracks on the border of Williamson and Bell Counties, the town of Bartlett, Texas, prospered in the early 20th century as a shipping point for grain, livestock and produce. The Bartlett Tribune, a weekly newspaper, provided lively coverage of the town, which reached a peak population of 2,200 in 1914 and had three banks, three cotton gins, a meat market and its own railway company, the Bartlett Western.
The University of North Texas Libraries will microfilm, digitize and provide free online access to issues of the Bartlett Tribune, now called the Tribune-Progress. The UNT Libraries received a $60,403 Library Cooperation Grant from the Texas State Library and Archives Commission to place issues of the Tribune that were published between 1902 and 1978 on UNT's Portal to Texas History. The portal, administered by the UNT Libraries' Digital Projects Unit, provides students and others with a digital gateway to collections in Texas:
* libraries
* museums
* archives
* historical societies
* private collections
The portal contains:
* maps
* books
* manuscripts
* diaries
* photographs
* letters
Library Cooperation Grants promote the development of public and private partnerships between libraries and other agencies and community-based organizations. The UNT Libraries will work with the Bartlett Activities Center and the Historical Society of Bartlett to digitize the newspapers during the project, called "The Bartlett Tribune: Seventy-seven Years of Local History."
Located in the area of Texas known as the Blackland Prairie, Bartlett today has about 1,700 residents, according to the 2005 census. The population began to decline during the 1930s because of the Great Depression and the closing of numerous businesses, including the Bartlett Western. The population reached a low of less than 1,450 in 1990.
Dreanna Belden, coordinator of grants and development for the UNT Libraries, said the libraries applied for a grant to digitize the Bartlett Tribune because the newspaper has significance for Williamson and Bell Counties.
"It documents the agricultural development of Texas and preserves the history of small town America," she said. "The story of transition from an agrarian society to an information society cannot be perceived without understanding the roots of small towns such as Bartlett, and there is no better basis for fathoming this shift than the local newspaper that documents everyday life, as well as regional perceptions of state and national news stories."
Dan Carper, an active member of the Bartlett Activities Center, helped to write the grant. He said the desire to digitize the newspapers is much more than preserving historical data.
"There's a great deal of history in those Bartlett papers," said Carper, who lived in Bartlett as a child but now lives in Austin. "On the surface, this project is about preserving important historical data. Those of us who grew up in the heart of the Blackland Prairie lived in the midst of that history. And we do have a strong emotional attachment to our memories of Bartlett."
He added, however, that the project "is about those who will find long-forgotten facts about their own people."
"It is about those who will learn about Blackland Prairie events and conditions they cannot find anywhere else. It is about history buffs, historians, educators, students, researchers, authors and the just plain curious. It is about generations and tomorrows," Carper said. "We at the Bartlett Activities Center are proud to be part of this project, and grateful to those who have made this possible."
Cathy Hartman, the UNT Libraries' assistant dean for digital and information technologies, said working with small communities to digitize their historical newspapers and make them available online "is a great pleasure for the Portal to Texas History team."
"Reading the articles that appeared in the Bartlett paper 50 to 100 years ago is almost as interesting as working with Dan Carper and hearing his stories about growing up in Bartlett," she said.
The UNT Libraries previously received a TexTreasures grant from the Texas State Library and Archives Commission to digitize and place newspapers published in Texas between 1829 and 1861 on the Portal to Texas History. These newspapers are currently the property of the Center for American History at the University of Texas at Austin.
UNT News Service Phone Number: (940) 565-2108
Contact: Nancy Kolsti (940) 565-3509
Email: nkolsti@unt.edu
