The history of Indianapolis lives in old newspaper archives. Can we get to it?

Back in the day, when newspapers were flush with resources, they had internal libraries or archives of all of their stories, casually referred to as morgues. It was common practice for reporters to “check the morgue” before writing any story about the community.

Reporters could learn the history of almost anything in Indianapolis by checking the morgue. There were clip files — a collection of physical articles — for historic buildings, every neighborhood in the city, people, issues and events. The files were refreshed every morning when librarians would cut up dozens of copies of that day’s newspapers, then neatly fold the clippings and add them to the relevant files.

Today, our records are digitized, which means anyone can access them from anywhere. And the economic tides have washed away newsroom resources, including staff librarians and the morgues they maintained. While some archivists and editors say it’s beneficial having more access to information at your fingertips, I asked them if something might have been lost to journalists and the community when physical clip files disappeared.

Editors at both the IndyStar and the Indianapolis Recorder told me that their journalists are adept at historical research, and pointed to examples where their reporters delved into the past, either to explain a traumatic event, give context to an anniversary, or update a story. The IndyStar’s story about 1970s life in the Circle City and The Recorder’s stories highlighting Black History Month illustrate this.

But do journalists bring history into their reporting often enough?

Take, for example, Gov. Mike Braun’s recent announcement that the state will end its Minority and Women’s Business Enterprises Program and Indiana’s Diversity Business Enterprises Program, which sought to strengthen the opportunities for minority and women business owners to get state contracts. These laws were passed by our state legislature in 1983. Why? What was happening back then? What’s different today?

Every news outlet that covered this announcement explained Braun’s reasoning and relied heavily on reactions from legislators and community groups. But they all lacked historical context.

Any number of current issues would benefit from more robust research and reference to the historical context to help news consumers understand how we got here.

The art of discovery: what’s lost in the digital era

April Hines is the journalism and mass communications librarian for the University of Florida Libraries. She helps students and researchers zero in on exactly what they’re looking for, maneuvering through all sorts of information repositories. The move from physical archives to digital has created many efficiencies for the public and journalists, she said. But it’s not without consequences.

“When you had those clip files, or a newspaper index, and you had content organized by subject, you had the element of discovery,” Hines said. “So you might open a clip file labeled ‘lawsuits’ and then you might find a lawsuit that you never even knew happened. So with keyword searching, you have to have a keyword to search for; you have to know what you’re searching for.”

Tulsa World reporter Randy Krehbiel knows this process well. In reporting on the 100th anniversary of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre for his newspaper’s coverage and two books he’s written on the subject, he delved into his newspaper’s clip files and archives.

“By doing that, and I didn’t really plan it this way, but by kind of immersing myself in these newspapers, it helped me understand better what it was like to live in 1921 and how that was similar and different to living at that time to 80 years later,” Krehbiel said.

Reporting on this story was a massive undertaking. He started working on the story in 1999. He read every issue of the Tulsa World from June 1, 1920 to the end of 1922 and every issue of a competing newspaper, the Tulsa Tribune, for the calendar year 1921.

Krehbiel’s one of few reporters in his newsroom who still knows how to access the newspaper’s morgue and does so frequently. The Tulsa World no longer has anyone to maintain the clip files. New reporters are shown where they are but that’s about it, he said. Krehbiel counts this as a loss for daily news coverage.

“I think it’s really hard for a young reporter to go to a city council meeting and they walk in there and they don’t know any of the history of any of the people in that room and they’re trying to follow what’s going on,” he said. “The history helps you understand, again, why they think what they think and say what they say…it’s just amazing how there are these thought strands that continue for generations.”

Krehbiel said that his assignment to cover the anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre and to create an archive for the paper was part of a broader effort by Tulsa World to better understand the Black community in Tulsa.

News outlets in Indianapolis also bring stories from the past into the present.

At the Indianapolis Recorder, which bills itself as the third oldest Black newspaper in the country, editor-in-chief Camike Jones said it is a “standing recommendation” that her reporters consult the paper’s archives when writing stories.

“I encourage it at all times because I do think the context matters and I do believe that having that historical understanding matters,” she said.

To celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day this year, she had the paper reprint The Recorder’s 1968 opinion piece by civil rights leader Whitney M. Young Jr., which explains his response to King’s assassination. Recently, she’s also used the paper’s historical archives to tell the story of a bootleg cab kingpin and to update the story of St. Philips Episcopal Church at their 125th anniversary.

Jones wants the public to know that they can access all of The Recorder’s stories starting in the early 2000s on the paper’s website. Stories before then are available through the Hoosier State Chronicles, Indiana’s statewide digital archive of historic newspapers, operated by the Indiana State Library. Both can be accessed by anyone, for free with an internet connection.

The IndyStar readers with paid subscriptions have access to the paper’s digital archive, going back to December 1845, through Newspapers.com. Executive editor Ryan Martin told me that members of the IndyStar’s staff “extensively reference the archives for reporting projects and initiatives.”

That shows up on a regular basis in their Sunday editions’ Retro Indy features. And recently, Arts and Creativity reporter Domenica Bongiovanni used the paper’s archives to tell the real story behind the film “Dead Man’s Wire,” and in her reporting on the Children’s Museum carousel.

“Our journalists are some of the strongest researchers I’ve worked with,” Martin said. “Their attention to history is clearly referenced in their accountability reporting.”

Journalism has changed since the advent of digital archives and the loss of physical ones, and how the community experiences the news has changed as well. I asked Hines, the UF librarian, what the community has lost with the digitization of news archives.

“I think what’s lost is, you know, newspapers are the first record of history,” she said. “So many times when you look up a photograph or what actually happened or those first kind of primary source accounts, a key place you’re going to find those is in a historical newspaper. But, if it hasn’t been digitized, if it hasn’t been made publicly available—or it’s stuck behind a paywall—then it’s much less accessible to those who could benefit the most.”

The digitization process is an expensive investment that not all newsrooms can make, Hines said. She’s even heard of some newspapers throwing their archives, especially photo morgues, in the trash, unable to find a suitable place to house them.

News consumers have options to dig deeper

“It is a win for everyone to be able to see newspapers online,” Maria McCauley, America Library Association president, told me in an email. “It is also wonderful to be able to view any archival material online, as accessibility is key. But very little can replace the experience of looking and researching something in person.”

The newspaper morgues of the past offered reporters ideas, reference points, and historical context. Since the digital age, two things have happened: reporters don’t need the physical copies anymore and newsrooms don’t have the money to maintain physical archives.

We’ve gained access to a trove of digitized newspapers, and we’ve also lost something as a community. News coverage today requires that the public come with some basic level of understanding of the past because the news doesn’t always hold the depth of historical context that it used to. As a news consumer, you have options beyond the news outlets themselves to see this history.

Maire Gurevitz, director of collections at the Indiana Historical Society, reminded me that their collection contains news records in print, film, and audio. Here are the resources available to the public online or at the historical society:

The Indianapolis Recorder’s photo morgue
The Indiana Jewish Post & Opinion and the Illiana News from the state’s Jewish community
El Amigo del Hogar and the Latin Times, newspapers from Northwest Indiana’s Latino community
Periodicals that document the state’s LGBTQ+ community, found in the Michael Bohr Collection of the Indy Pride Chris Gonzalez Library and Archives
WTLC’s Like It Is, Indianapolis’ first predominately Black-owned and operated radio station
Hoosier State Chronicles, Indiana’s historical newspapers’ collection, operated by the Indiana State Library

If you’re adept at using these resources, you’ll be a more informed and critical news consumer.

Please join me at my next News & Nibbles: Let’s Talk Media event at the Glendale branch of the Indianapolis Public Library this Thursday, July 23 from 10:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. (3660 E. 62nd St., Indianapolis, IN 46220)

Tracey Compton is Poynter’s Indianapolis Public Editor. You can send your questions about local media to her at indypubliceditor@poynter.org.

Mirror Indy publishes the Indianapolis public editor columns as part of a partnership with Poynter Institute to increase media literacy and trust in local journalism.