Quote:
Originally Posted by Bugsy
I should also mention that it might be worthwhile calling a reference librarian in the Colorado public library system. The might have access to some materials that are not available online. They might also have a few connections to other local resources not in the CO public library system (i.e. a private library) that might have what you need.
Good luck!
Chris
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+1
Contacting a reference librarian local to the area is a great idea.
My experience researching things has been that even fairly mainstream items of recent vintage can be essentially uncataloged and definetly aren't online.
I have a bike from 1982 that was sold to me as having been used for a review in Bicycling magazine in 1985. NO local library had hard copy older than 3 years, and only Cambridge had microfilm. (Not even BPL) Also Bicycling isn't cataloged in readers guide to periodical literature. As I was starting to go through their microfilm collection - Also largely unindexed aside from month and publications included (All publications from one month together instead of all of the same title!) One of the librarians found an index that was very obscure. That and the name of the builder got me to the month and an actual date of 1982. And that got me the article, and a bunch of better information about that bikes place in history.
Much online stuff has been indexed either electronically, or by college students. Either way the indexes aren't all that acurate. Google has done all the US patents, but the OCR they used had problems with some of the early 1900's typefaces used. And both of the indexes for Harpers are very incomplete, often listing only one article from a page that might have 6 or more.
And neither indexes ads at all.
But the local research librarian will usually be able to point you to a local resource such as city books, which list all addesses, and all businesses in the city at the time of publication, or microfilm of locally held documents or newspapers. They usually don't have much time to do a lot of research but a photocopy of a page from a city directory is usally fine. (Some charge a small fee, but what they turn up is usually worth it.)
Steve B