For more than a century The Herald has been the daily record of Snohomish County, keeping the community informed on the latest news. But if you want to travel back in time to read about our history as it was reported, make your way to the downtown branch of the Everett Public Library.
If you are looking to browse a copy of The Herald from the last several weeks, the library has an area with comfy chairs and a bank of tall windows to relax with a printed copy of the newspaper. But to go further back in time, head upstairs.
Every issue of The Herald, since the first publication on Feb. 11, 1901, is available to browse on microfilm or microfiche. The reels of microfilm and the viewers are on the second floor of the library, on the right after reaching the top of the stairs.
A majority of the archive is not indexed, so you will need to know the dates of the stories you want explore. If, for example, you want to read how The Herald covered the space race, first research what key dates you want to know about; the Sputnik I launch on Oct. 4, 1957; the first American man in space on May 5, 1961; the first man on the moon on July 20, 1969; or the start of the space shuttle program with the first flight of the Columbia on April 12, 1981. Locate the reel of microfilm and place it in the viewer. Once you find the page, you can print out copies (the first five copies are free). Or you can save the page as an image on a personal flash drive. If you need any help, a librarian can assist you.
If you are looking for an item between 1971 and 1991, you can thank the late librarian Hazel Clark for making your search a little easier. During those 20 years Clark indexed every edition of The Herald and organized them by subject.
If you are trying find local stories on the infamous D.B. Cooper, a story that captured the attention of the nation in the early 1970s, you may want to look up the original story as well as those that follow. Clark’s index allows you to look up the names or subjects in a three-ring binder with alphabetized key names and phrases.
A few sample categories: Atomic Power Plants; Hippopotamus; Deaths, Unexplained; Independence Day; Lawn Bowling.
And various names like Lee, Bruce; Evans, Daniel J.; and Bundy, Theodore (“Ted”)
Online you can browse some wonderful photographs from Everett’s history in the digital collections at epls.org.
The Herald has a collection of more than 100 photos to browse through from the 1950s and 1960s (www.epls.org/nw/dig_herald_photos.asp) by Herald photographers Jim Leo, Ray Waters and Ken Knudson. You can look at photos in the following categories: Aerial Views, Airline Industry, Disasters, Parades, Pageants, Recreation, Sports and Stores.
Another terrific gallery of images is in the Juleen Studio collection of about 5,000 photographs from 1912 through about 1940, some of which were published in The Herald.
Each week, Here at The Herald provides an inside peek at the newspaper. Is there something you would like to know? Email Executive Editor Neal Pattison, npattison@heraldnet.com.
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