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Digital Newberry

@digitalnewberry.bsky.social
171 followers 154 following 27 posts

Exploring the Newberry Library's digital collections: rare maps, historical documents, postcards, and unexpected finds. Browse, discover, and help us transcribe. Free and open to all.

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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Gertrude Stein has joined Newberry Transcribe ✨ New letters to Sherwood Anderson + 1,500 more pages, including Ben Hecht, Isaac Stevens Metcalf, Graham Taylor, and two Rodgers family travel journals. Read more and start transcribing: digitalnewberry.substack.com/p/gertrude-s...
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
In honor of Widow’s Bay’s Emmy sweep—and Kate O’Flynn’s win for Patricia—we’re bringing this one back. 🔮🏆 The Newberry’s Book of Magical Charms knew all along.
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Civil War diaries in Pitman shorthand. A great-granddaughter trying for years to read them. And the Newberry Transcribe volunteers who had already solved the mystery. Plus 1,100 new pages + bicycle postcards, because bicycle weather. 🚲 digitalnewberry.substack.com/p/a-family-m...
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Ready for Labor Day weekend? Americans a century ago had postcards for that. These ca. 1910 Labor Day cards celebrate workers with eagles, anvils, cornucopias, flags—and some truly strenuous typography. Happy Labor Day weekend from the Newberry! collections.newberry.org/C.aspx?VP3=D...
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 10/08/2026
Back-to-school, but make it relatable: the front-row student who seems to realize, mid-photo, that this was a mistake. This kindergarten class and their teachers were photographed at the Sac and Fox Indian School in Stroud, Oklahoma, circa 1910s. collections.newberry.org/asset-manage...
Sepia-toned historic group photo of a kindergarten class and their teachers standing on the steps of the Sac and Fox Indian School in Stroud, Oklahoma, circa the 1910s. The children are arranged in rows; one girl in the front row has her hand over her face, creating a strikingly relatable class-photo moment.
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
Two more John M. Wing diaries are now on Newberry Transcribe—more war, work, printing, and Charley drama. Plus: Route 66 turns 100, with breakdowns, bad motels, and brutally honest traveler reviews behind the postcard fronts. Read more: digitalnewberry.substack.com/p/heartbreak...
digitalnewberry.substack.com
Heartbreak, Civil War, and 1,600+ New Pages: The Wing Diaries Continue
Two more John M.
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
National Ice Cream Day on July 19 may be a made-up holiday, but it’s one we’re happy to celebrate. 🍦 Take a sweet mid-20th c. trip through the Newberry collections: collections.newberry.org/CS.aspx?VP3=...
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 02/07/2026
Fireworks, flags, patriotic scarves: the Newberry Postcard Sender is ready for the Fourth. Send a vintage postcard from the archive, then stick around for Revolutionary-era manuscripts and 2,200+ new pages on Newberry Transcribe. digitalnewberry.substack.com/p/this-fourt...
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 12/06/2026
Ben Hecht helped write the sound of screwball comedy: fast-talking, snappy, and never short on drama. Now you can help transcribe his letters to his daughter Jenny -- part of 1,500 new pages just added to Newberry Transcribe: nt.newberry.org/transcribe
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 28/05/2026
We were watching Widow's Bay when Patricia's self-help book took a distinctly occult turn -- and suddenly looked very familiar. The Newberry's "Book of magical charms" has entered the chat. collections.newberry.org/asset-manage...
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 20/05/2026
A volunteer transcriber followed the clues in an unidentified 1880 diary — and gave its author her name back. Plus: nearly 700 new pages are ready for transcription, including Jenny Hecht letters, Graham Taylor correspondence, and more. digitalnewberry.substack.com/p/every-diar...
digitalnewberry.substack.com
Every Diary Has a Secret. Some Get Solved.
Two volunteers, one anonymous diary, and an identification 140 years in the making. Plus: 700 new pages just added to Newberry Transcribe, waiting to give up their secrets.
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 12/05/2026
Kids can't read cursive. Lily King credits Sherwood Anderson with helping to make her a writer. We just added 700 pages of his papers to Newberry Transcribe. It all connects: digitalnewberry.substack.com/p/help-unloc...
digitalnewberry.substack.com
Help unlock 700 pages from the Sherwood Anderson papers
Cursive is making headlines again—not as nostalgia, but as a form of access.
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 05/05/2026
A shipwreck. A baby no one could identify. A girl who grew up not knowing who she was. That story turned up in a 1910 love letter from Muriel Bent to Stanley Harris. Learn more, then help transcribe 1,100 newly-added pages from the same collection: digitalnewberry.substack.com/p/fancy-know...
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 13/02/2026
Big news for #DouglassDay! We officially unveiled a stunning new gallery of Black History materials in Newberry Digital Collections at our event! From our stacks to your screen—check out the new gallery today: 📍 publications.newberry.org/gallery/?g=2...
A librarian stands in front of large screen that displays digitized Black history material while a room full of event attendees look on.
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 13/02/2026
Our #DouglassDay cake by Elisa's Cake by the #Pound is gorgeous and delicious!
Cake decorated with pink, red and white roses with the words All Rights for All.
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 13/02/2026
Today we're celebrating #DouglassDay with @douglassday.bsky.social, students from Loyola Center for Textual Studies and Digital Humanities, and volunteers around the world. You could hear a pin-drop in the room during the powerful reading of “Why Hold a Colored Convention?” by Hassan El-Amin.
Participants at Douglass Day Transcribing event sitting at tables, with laptops, at the Newberry Library in Chicago.
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 12/02/2026
We just hit 150,000 items (that's 1.6 million files!) in our digital collections. One of the recent additions that put us over the top? This 1914 children's book, "The Gingerbread Dog." 🐶 collections.newberry.org/asset-manage...
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 11/02/2026
📌 Where to find us: 🔍 Browse our digital collections -- thousands of rare maps, manuscripts, postcards, and more, all free and online collections.newberry.org ✍️ Help us transcribe historical documents on Newberry Transcribe (no experience needed, just curiosity) nt.newberry.org
Screenshot of the Newberry Library Digital Collections homepage featuring a pastel illustration of a polar bear on ice with mountains and a sun; a banner invites browsing the digital collections, with “Browse all” and “Recently added” thumbnails below.Screenshot of the Newberry Transcribe homepage with a purple handwriting background; a large panel reads “Newberry Transcribe — Unlock history!” with buttons for “Learn more” and “Browse manuscripts,” and a row of project tiles below.
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Digital Newberry @digitalnewberry.bsky.social · 11/02/2026
How shall I begin? With a first post, of course. Follow along for highlights from our digital collections 🏓 collections.newberry.org/asset-manage... #Libraries #SpecialCollections
Vintage illustrated postcard: a man and woman stand at a ping-pong table holding paddles. Handwritten text at upper right reads, ‘How shall I begin.’
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