Starting in June, Library patrons will be able to access the Historical San Jose Mercury News database, thanks to grants from proceeds of the 2007 Santa Clara Historic Home Tour and from the Foundation & Friends of the Santa Clara City Library. This database is a fully digitized, remote-access online version of the daily San Jose Mercury newspapers for the years 1886-1922, in which every word is searchable.

This resource is extremely valuable for researching historical information about Santa Clara City and County pioneers, clubs and organizations, churches, businesses, schools, and news of the day. Besides major news articles, advertisements, real estate transactions, death and marriage notices, and society gossip columns are fully searchable. The search results are presented as images of newspaper pages and clippings, so one can view the etchings and photographs that are part of the ads and articles.

This database will appeal to a variety of researchers: genealogists whose families were pioneers in Santa Clara County; owners of historical homes and businesses; members of long established community churches and clubs; students working on local history term papers; and City staff working on historic projects. It also will be used to fill in the gaps and improve some of the local history and early settler files in the Central Park Library Heritage Pavilion.

A few examples of headline articles that Library staff found during a database trial include:

• May 15, 1892: An Ideal Home: The Magnificent Estate of New Park, Santa Clara: Vineyards and Orchards: A Place Which has No Counterpart in California—The Fine Property for Sale [95 Acres].
• July 6, 1906:  Real Estate Conditions are Highly Gratifying: Orchard Sold by Geo. Rutherford to Abram Block for $300 an acre: Decided Activity in All Lines of Trade—Merchants Record Briskness.
• April 21, 1907: City of Santa Clara Famous for Public Ownership: Unique Atmosphere of Stability, Age and Culture in Santa Clara: Wonderful ‘Changes’ of Progress Since Early Mission was Founded (photos)
• August 3, 1920: Opinions/Letters: Valley of Hearts Delight is Silly Slogan: We Make Machinery for World Consumption, Why Not Let World know This: Spray Pumps and Truck Axles Widely Known…(chamber of commerce should promote this, not silly twaddle phrases)