The Times offers 200 years of history online.

• Author: Swartz, Nikki
• Position: UP FRONT: News, Trends & Analysis - Brief article

History buffs now can read The Times of London's coverage of the Jack the Ripper murders in 1888, Amelia Earhart's solo flight across the Atlantic in 1932, and more historical events, thanks to an elaborate digital newspaper archive that includes 200 years of news.

The Times Online archive includes more than 20 million articles from every edition of the famous paper, except for a small number of damaged issues, from 1785 to 1985. The archive includes letters to the editor, photos, and advertisements, and each page appears as it was printed in the paper on a parchment-colored screen.

Thomson Gale has already digitized the first 200 years of back issues. Notable coverage includes the Battle of Waterloo and the execution of Marie Antoinette. Pages are scanned using optical character recognition technology, and the more than 150 topic pages, such as...