Newspapers

The Special Collections and Archives collection includes the full run of Denver's two major newspapers, the Rocky Mountain News and The Denver Post, as well as other newspapers that reported on Denver and many Colorado towns.

The Rocky Mountain News digital collections contains 300,000+ born digital photographs published from the 1990s to 2009. These include images of the Broncos, Colorado Rockies and other professional sports teams; events such as the visit to Denver by Pope John Paul II; the Oklahoma City trial; the 2008 Democratic National Convention, as well as the Rocky’s Pulitzer Prize photos. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions about the Rocky Mountain News digital collections, please contact us on our contact form, choosing Rocky Mountain News from the dropdown subject menu. For more information on the Rocky Mountain News archives and how best to search them, see the Rocky Mountain News at the Denver Public Library Guide. 

The Blair-Caldwell African American Research Library collection includes newspapers focused on African American life, culture and history. Some of the non-indexed materials include a broad list of African American newspapers on microfilm from 1893 to 2000, such as the Afro-American, the Chicago Defender, The New York Amsterdam News, the Philadelphia Tribune, the Michigan Chronicle and The Call. Also a southern perspective can be found in the Atlanta Daily World and the Birmingham World.

Holdings for both collections exist in microfilm, and in some instances, in hard copy. We also link to current Denver neighborhood newspapers, some of which have online archives. To request a copy of a newspaper article, please use the contact form to provide us with citation information.

Research Tools

Access World News (NewsBank)

Formerly known as America's Newspapers.

Full-text of the Denver Post, the Denver Rocky Mountain News and hundreds of newspapers nationwide. Denver coverage from June 1989. Other papers' coverage varies.

Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection (CHNC)

A service of the Colorado State Library, the Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection (CHNC) currently includes more than 2 million digitized pages, representing more than 553 individual newspaper titles published in Colorado from 1859 up to 2020.

Western History Subject Index

Western History Subject Index (formerly the General Index) card file contains more than seven million entries on four million cards. Developed over the last century, it provides access to newspapers, local histories, biographical works, newsletters and journals.

Guide to Colorado Newspapers

Donald E. Oehlerts prepared this convenient reference tool listing newspapers published in Colorado from 1859-1963, and which Colorado institutions held copies of these as of the early 1960s.

Rocky Mountain News Digital Collections

The Rocky Mountain News Digital Collections contains 300,000+ born digital photographs published from the 1990s to 2009. These include images of the Broncos, Colorado Rockies and other profession sports teams; events such as the visit to Denver by Pope John Paul II; the Oklahoma City trial; as well as the Rocky’s Pulitzer Prize photos.

Western History Subject Index Abbreviations

The WHSI includes abbreviations to a wide variety of indexed sources. While the full title for the abbreviated title or work is sometimes easy to discern -- e.g., RMN for the Rocky Mountain News or DP for the Denver Post -- others are more obscure or refer to materials or collections whose designations or call numbers have since changed. To simplify use of the Index, these abbreviations have been linked to the catalog records for the indexed items. Users may then follow the hyperlink to the Denver Public Library's catalog for a full description of the item and its availability.

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Major Daily Newspapers (includes the former National Newspapers Core)

Search or browse the full text of these major newspapers

  • New York Times, June 1980-current
  • New York Times Historical, 1851-2013
  • Wall Street Journal, January 1984-current
  • Chicago Tribune, January 1985-current
  • Los Angeles Times, January 1985-current
  • Washington Post, January 1987-current