This week we have added 140,106 new pages to The Archive, meaning in total we are just shy of 30 million pages available to search, with a current total of 29,905,890 pages.

We have added one brand new title, the Sunday World (Dublin), which is full of amusing agony aunt anecdotes, and updated five of our existing titles. Updated titles include the Carlisle Journal, the Perthshire Advertiser and the Manchester Evening News, as well as two of our Irish titles, the Drogheda Argus & Leinster Journal and the New Ross Standard.

This week we have added a long run of pages to the Carlisle Journal, which span the second half of the nineteenth century and the early twentieth century. At the turn of the new century, the North West of England was hit by a frightening epidemic, which was dubbed the ‘Beer Scare of 1900.’ This so-called ‘Beer Scare’ saw the widespread contamination of  beer with arsenic. This caused peripheral neuritis in drinkers, and it was thought that up to 6,000 people were affected by it, and 70 people died. Using the Carlisle Journal, it is possible discover more about this largely forgotten disaster.

An article published in the Carlisle Journal on 7 December 1900 describes how ‘The epidemic arising from drinking impure beer continues to be of a serious character in Manchester and other towns.’ A week later, the same newspaper announces that a government inquiry has been ordered, and that another death attributed to the contaminated beer had been reported in Liverpool. In addition, at Crumpsall Workhouse, two women, Ellen Hines (50) and Jane Hill (43) are listed as poisoning victims. Meanwhile, in Ulverston, 4,000 barrels of beer were destroyed, as ‘an analysis proved the traces of arsenic.’

Carlisle Journal | 14 December 1900

The source of the arsenic poisoning was eventually traced to a refiners in Liverpool, Bostock & Co. of Garston, who had used sulphuric acid (made from arsenical iron pyrites) to manufacture glucose. The incident led to a tighter control on the ingredients used in the production of beer, and meanwhile, other brewers were quick to seize on advertising opportunities to promote their pure and uncontaminated products, such as O’Connell’s.

Evening Herald (Dublin) | 1 December 1900

Dublin Evening Telegraph | 24 December 1900

New Titles

Updated Titles

This week we have updated five of our existing titles.

You can learn more about each of the titles we add to every week by clicking on their names. On each paper’s title page, you can read a FREE sample issue, learn more about our current holdings, and our plans for digitisation.

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You can keep up to date with all the latest additions by visiting the recently added page.  You can even look ahead to see what we’re going to add tomorrow.