New Mexico State Library

Newspaper Collection

Newspapers at the New Mexico State Library

The New Mexico State Library’s newspaper collection includes current issues on print and microfilm, and historic newspapers on microfilm. The microfilm collection contains thousands of reels of newspapers dating back to 1849. You can find a listing of the newspapers that are held in the microfilm collection on our New Mexico Newspapers on Microfilm research guide.   If you need assistance finding a newspaper, please Ask-a-Librarian.

In addition to New Mexico newspapers, we have a subscription to the New York Times.

Using Newspaper Microfilm Resources at the New Mexico State Library

The New Mexico State Library’s Southwest Collection holds thousands of rolls of microfilm for New Mexico newspapers dating from the territorial period of the 1850’s to the present. Most newspaper microfilm is available for interlibrary loan. The State Library will loan any other library up to 3 reels of microfilm per request for a period of 30 days. Please contact your local library to initiate your request. Microfilm reader/printers are available on site. Since we do loan microfilm, not every reel is available for in-library use every day. Please check our New Mexico Newspapers on Microfilm research guide or contact the Southwest Reference for assistance at 505-476-9709.

Historic New Mexico Newspapers Online

Chronicling America provides access to historic pre-1923 newspapers from all around the United States. Thus far, New Mexico has contributed almost 10,000 issues from 16 newspapers, dating back as early as 1890. These issues are full-text searchable and downloadable free online at the Library of Congress.

UNM Digital Collection includes digitized materials from libraries, archives, and museums in New Mexico. Focusing on the history and culture of New Mexico, the collections cover other topics and geographic areas as well. Over 100,000 pages of newspapers from around the state have been digitized, and the project continues.

New Mexico Newspaper Databases and Indexes

EL Portal  provides free 24/7 access to New Mexico residents to selected articles from newspapers around the United States, the world, and New Mexico.

Newsbank is an online, searchable database providing access to selected articles from the following three New Mexico newspapers:  Albuquerque Journal 1/1/1995-present; The Santa Fe New Mexican 1994 – current; and the Roswell Daily Record 1/2/2002-present.

Obituary Database (Fray Angélico Chávez History Library) This database is an index to obituaries in New Mexico newspapers and covers the period from the 1870’s to 31 December 2005. This index is not complete and for the second half of the 20th century it is only a Santa Fe obituary index.