I have a customer who wants to do research in old newspapers. How can I find out what is available at the State Library Resource Center?

The web page of the Periodicals Department of the State Library Resource Center (SLRC) is a good place to start!

Scroll down the page until you see the heading "What We Have." Under that heading click on "Newspapers." If you are doing local newspaper research scroll down the page until you see the heading "Local Newspapers on Microfilm." You can search Baltimore City Newspapers by title or dates of publication. These tables are completely up-to-date and accurate. You can search the SLRC collection of other Maryland papers from around the state by title, by county, and by city. These tables are currently being updated. They are for the most part accurate, but I would give a call to the SLRC Periodicals Department (410-396-5451) before arriving there just to verify that a particular paper in a particular date range is indeed on the shelf.

If you are doing research using historical papers from out-of-town, look under the heading "Out-Of-Town Newspapers on Microfilm."

The SLRC Periodicals Department has microfilm reader/printers that you can use to read these papers. The staff will be happy to teach you how to operate these machines.