Today, North America’s oldest surviving newspaper, the Quebec Telegraph-Chronicle, celebrates its 250th anniversary. It was originally published as a bilingual newspaper, called The Quebec Gazette – La Gazette de Québec. And I have discovered even more about the history of this publication and online resources.
Historian Charles André Nadeau attributes the newspaper’s longevity to its ability to change and adapt to the needs of the community in Quebec City. In a 250th anniversary commemorative video that is worth watching, Mr. Nadeau says there was almost no local news in the first eight to ten years the newspaper was published. It had no journalists and was basically a printing company that published old news about Europe and the 13 colonies.
Image from “The Quebec Chronicle-Telegraph’s 250th Anniversary Commemorative Video.”
Online issues
When I wrote earlier this week about the 250th anniversary and online issues of the newspaper, I had neglected to check Quebec’s number one resource for archives, the Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec. Fortunately, my friend Jacques Gagné was on the ball and sent me a reminder.
On the Quebec Archives’ website, you will find many issues of the Quebec Chronicle, from 1898 to 1924. While the description on the website is written in French, unilingual Anglophones will find it very easy to find the dates they want to browse.
Other years of the newspaper have been digitized and are available on Google News: The Quebec Gazette, 1775 – 1870, and the Quebec Chronicle-Telegraph, 1953 – 1970.
Take a look photos of the interior of the building that housed the Quebec Chronicle-Telegraph from 1925-1949 in Old news: Who reads the newspaper anymore, anyway?
Montreal Gazette, The Quebec Chronicle-Telegraph celebrates 250 years in print: “William Brown and Thomas Gilmore agreed to join forces and borrow £450 and bring a printing press up to Quebec City to found The Quebec Gazette on June 21, 1764. As printing presses had been banned in New France, this was something new.”
