ANN ARBOR, Mich., January 14, 2005 - ProQuest Information and Learning announced that it will bring the rich resources of The Boston Globe's historical content to the ProQuest Historical Newspapers collection, under an existing agreement with The New York Times Company. The resource will be available to academic institutions and libraries, primary and secondary schools, and government and corporate libraries. ProQuest Information and Learning, a unit of ProQuest Company, creates and publishes databases for libraries and educational institutions worldwide.

In the release, historical news content from The Boston Globe will be available online from its first published edition in 1872 though 1922.   The Globe, winner of 17 Pulitzer Prizes, is considered the mainstay for Bostonand New England regional news coverage.  The database will launch in March 2005.

Rod Gauvin, ProQuest senior vice president, marketing and publishing, said:  “We’re very pleased to add The Boston Globe to our extensive collection of major U.S.newspapers in our Historical Newspapers program. With its unique voice and coverage of regional and national as well as local news and issues, The Boston Globe has emerged as the preeminent news source for the New England region. Because of its editorial excellence, we believe The Boston Globe makes a strong contribution to the Historical Newspaper product line.  It will be a valuable research database for a wide variety of academic, public and school libraries.”

Researchers will be able to study significant events as they appeared in contemporary news accounts, such as Lizzie Borden’s 1893 trial for the axe-murders of her family, or the Sacco-Vanzetti trial, one of the most controversial trials of the 20^th century.  The pair of Italian anarchists was arrested outside of Bostonin 1920 for murder and robbery.  Their case became sensationalized because of their politics and past crimes in the widespread anti-immigration sentiment of post-World War I.

Using advanced zoning and digitizing techniques, ProQuest will digitally reproduce every issue from cover to cover ─ not just news stories and editorials, but also photos, graphics, and advertisements.  Even novice researchers can navigate the database unassisted with fully searchable ASCII text and multiple search options (keyword, dates, author's name, article type, etc.)   To see the text, the user simply chooses the article, and the article image is displayed. Users will also be able to display the full page image of any page in any issue. The database will be completely browseable by issue, allowing searchers to browse through entire issues page by page as they would a printed paper.

The ProQuest Historical Newspapers project encompasses newspapers with deep historical value for researchers in various fields. The Boston Globe will join other prestigious U.S.newspapers already in the ProQuest program:  The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Christian Science Monitor, The WashingtonPost, ChicagoTribune, and Los Angeles Times.  All of the newspapers are cross-searchable across each other and across all other ProQuest databases.

Libraries may receive more information by contacting their account representative at 1-800-521-0600, ext. 3183 or 3452 (outside the U.S., call +44-1-223-215-512) or pqsales@il.proquest.com. Editors may call 1-800-521-0600, ext. 6489 or email pr@il.proquest.com.

About The BostonGlobe

The Boston Globe is a wholly owned subsidiary of The New York Times Company (NYSE: NYT), a leading media company with 2003 revenues of $3.2 billion, which includes The New York Times, the International Herald Tribune, The Boston Globe, 16 other newspapers, eight network-affiliated television stations, two New York City radio stations and more than 40 Web sites, including NYTimes.com and Boston.com. For the fourth consecutive year, the company was ranked No. 1 in the publishing industry in Fortune’s 2004 list of America’s Most Admired Companies. The company’s core purpose is to enhance society by creating, collecting and distributing high-quality news, information and entertainment.

About ProQuest
ProQuest creates specialized information resources and technologies that propel successful research, discovery, and lifelong learning. A global leader in serving libraries of all types, ProQuest offers the expertise of such respected brands as Chadwyck-Healey™, UMI®, SIRS®, and eLibrary®. With Serials Solutions®, Ulrich's™, RefWorks®, COS™, Dialog® and now Bowker® part of the ProQuest brand family, the company supports the breadth of the information community with innovative discovery solutions that power the business of books and the best in research experience.

More than a content provider or aggregator, ProQuest is an information partner, creating indispensable research solutions that connect people and information. Through innovative, user-centered discovery technology, ProQuest offers billions of pages of global content that includes historical newspapers, dissertations, and uniquely relevant resources for researchers of any age and sophistication—including content not likely to be digitized by others. Inspired by its customers and their end users, ProQuest is working toward a future that blends information accessibility with community to further enhance learning and encourage lifelong enrichment.

For more information, visit www.proquest.com or the ProQuest parent company website, www.cig.com.