Northern Allegany Observer

Newspaper Project

In March of 2005 a local volunteer began to copy the archived Northern Allegany Observer newspapers  here at the museum. 

Judson Howden first began publication of the NAO in May of 1888 in Fillmore, NY a copy of which is here! To start on a family tradition his son Melvin Howden followed his father as the next editor and publisher.

Copies of these are now available for the public to read for historical research or just for enjoyment. The years copied so far are all years ending with a 1, 6, 7, 8, 9,0 starting with 1888 up to the 1960's. The 1970's through the 1990's will be copied at a later date due to the condition of the older papers.

We thought the project would end with just copies of the newspapers however, that is not the case. Now we have the capibility to scan the copies and convert those into searchable PDF files. There are over twelve years that are searchable. It is a slow process and will take sometime to have all the years scanned and searchable. The question has been raised will these files be available on the internet, the answer is no at this time.

The copied newspapers were used to research the history of the Hume Baptist Church. As a result a very complete list of pastors was published in a commenorative book for the church's 175th anniversary in 2010.

In January 2011 over 40 Fillmore Central School ninth graders came to the museum to start a class project on local history. Their focus was 1940-1960; the end result was a colaberation of all the students hard work into a history book.

This has been an exciting project and a huge undertaking to say the very least and would not have come as far as it has without the dedication of Nancy Gillette.