Canada’s largest newspaper until the 1950s was the Montreal Star. From 1869 until it was closed in 1979 after a lengthy strike, it was the dominant English-language paper in the city.
Coverage of my great-grandfather’s sudden death and funeral in the Montreal Star was lengthy and one of the articles included a photo of him. In comparison, the Montreal Gazette‘s reports on his passing were shorter and didn’t include a photo.
While I’ve found many articles about my ancestors and relatives in the Montreal Gazette on Newspapers.com and Google News Archive, I’m sure there are even more articles about them in the Star.
The problem is, unlike the Montreal Gazette, the only way to do research in the Montreal Star is on microfilm where you can’t search by keyword.
The good news is this is going to change.
BAnQ responds
In reply to my question about why the Montreal Star hasn’t been digitized, Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec (BAnQ) said, in French, “The copyright-free portion of the Montreal Star is part of BAnQ’s digitization program and we hope that issues can be distributed in 2022.”
Oh, happy day!
Depending on what the copyright law in Canada indicates, it looks like BAnQ should be able to digitize Montreal Star issues from 1869 until at least 1900, and probably several years later.
The remaining question is who owns the Montreal Star‘s copyright?
BAnQ has been unable to find out.
I would have thought it was the Montreal Gazette‘s owners, but it appears that may not be the case.
In their email, BAnQ explained their dilemma.
“To digitize more recent issues, we will need to find the rights holders of this newspaper. If you ever have any leads to help us find them, please contact us.”
So, mark your calendar for 2022 to start seeing digitized issues of the Montreal Star.
In the meantime, you can look at the digitized newspapers available on BAnQ’s website.
Hats off to the staff at BAnQ for responding to my email enquiry within only a couple of weeks — and for providing the answer many of us had hoped for.
