Rough draft college station6/5/2023 The Battalion started production in 1893 and is the longest-running student newpaper at Texas A&M. The Battalion is the longest-running student newspaper at Texas A&M, having been continuously published since 1893 except for a short period in 1918 during World War I. Austin and Calliopean Literary Societies until 1906, when publication was taken over by the Student Association. The Battalion started production in 1893 as a monthly publication by the Stephen F. “Ideally, we’d like to get the original copies for our holdings.” From 1893 to 2018 “Hopefully people will come forward with issues of The Battalion that we don’t have in our collection so that we can digitize those as well,” said Bailey. Approximately 4,000 issues of The Battalion are currently available online, while all digitized copies will be available soon. Most of the work of digitizing the more than 11,000 print issues in the collection has been completed by the Libraries’ own student workers. “We are digitizing them not only for access, but also to take care of the physical collection in the process, making sure the physical newspapers are preserved in the most appropriate way for the collection and for the type of material they are made of,” said Julie Mosbo, director of preservation. Another advantage of digitizing the collection is that this resource will now be available to an audience beyond the boundaries of campus. This will ensure that not only a complete digital record is created, but also that the physical newspapers will continue to be available to researchers who desire to use the native artifact. The Preservation Unit will preserve and conserve the newspapers before they are digitized. The project is a coordinated effort between Texas A&M University Archivist Greg Bailey and the Preservation and Digital Initiatives Units in the Libraries. Having been created using inexpensive, acidic wood pulp, many copies are now fragile, torn or bound using outdated methods. However, the current condition of the newspapers is an issue. These requests come from academic researchers as well as members of the public looking for information about family and friends. The decision to start the project was driven by the high number of requests the Libraries receive to view back issues of The Battalion. “It allows us to look back and see how the paper has evolved, both from a content and design standpoint, as well as an observer.” “The Battalion is an excellent record of our university’s history,” said Brad Morse ’18, who served as the newspaper’s editor for the spring 2018 semester. Using the same technology as the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., staff at the Texas A&M University Libraries have begun the process of digitizing every edition of The Battalion to preserve them. The Texas A&M University Libraries have begun digitizing issues of The Battalion in an effort to preserve them and provide public access.
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