National Digital Newspaper Program | 20190115 PJ

Opportunity Information: Apply for 20190115 PJ

The National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP) is a cooperative effort between the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the Library of Congress (LC) designed to build a long-term, nationwide digital collection of historically important U.S. newspapers. The program focuses on newspapers published between 1690 and 1963 across all states and U.S. territories, with the end goal of making these materials freely searchable online for researchers, educators, genealogists, students, and the general public. The digitized pages are hosted and permanently maintained by the Library of Congress and made accessible through the Chronicling America Historic American Newspapers website. Alongside the digitized newspaper pages, the initiative also maintains a national newspaper directory that provides bibliographic details and holdings information, helping users locate newspaper titles in any format, not just digital.

The grant opportunity supports state- or territory-based projects, typically led by a single organization within a state or territory that coordinates with key local partners such as state libraries, archives, historical societies, universities, and other repositories with newspaper collections. The NDNP has already brought in most of the country, with forty-six states and one territory previously funded, including a long list of participants such as California, Texas, New York, Florida, Ohio, Puerto Rico, and many others. Even with that progress, NEH states an intention to support projects in every state and U.S. territory over time, and it structures the program so places that have not yet received NDNP funding, or have received fewer than three awards, are given priority consideration.

The work funded under NDNP is substantial and very specific. Over a two-year project period, awardees are expected to select historically significant newspaper titles published in their jurisdiction within the 1690 to 1963 window and digitize approximately 100,000 pages, preferably using existing microfilm as the source. Digitization must follow Library of Congress technical guidelines so that the resulting files are consistent, searchable, and suitable for long-term preservation and public access through the LC platform. The typical longer-term pathway for a state partner is to apply for a first award and then pursue second and third awards, with the program encouraging participants to ultimately reach roughly 300,000 digitized pages per state through successive rounds of funding. While additional support beyond a third award can occur, the program emphasizes expanding coverage and bringing in jurisdictions with little or no prior NDNP funding.

A major requirement of this opportunity is that only public domain newspaper content is eligible for digitization and inclusion. Applicants must confirm that selected titles are in the public domain, and there is added scrutiny for anything published after 1922. For post-1922 newspapers, eligibility is limited to titles published without copyright or titles for which copyright was not registered or renewed by 1963, meaning they are considered to be in the public domain. If an awardee chooses to digitize newspapers published after 1922, there is also a specific condition of award requiring the recipient to indemnify NEH and the Library of Congress, reflecting the legal risk associated with copyright determinations and reinforcing the expectation that awardees will do careful rights verification.

The program also explicitly welcomes collaboration models, particularly partnerships that pair experienced NDNP awardees with new or less-experienced entrants. These collaborations can include arrangements where an established project helps manage workflows, advises on file creation and delivery, provides ongoing consultation, or hosts formal training for project staff through workshops or onsite institutes. NDNP has already supported several cross-state or cross-territory collaborations, including Arkansas and Mississippi, Florida and Puerto Rico, multiple Minnesota partnerships (with Iowa and the Dakotas), Montana and Idaho, Texas with New Mexico and Oklahoma, and Virginia and West Virginia, showing that the program values shared expertise and scalable approaches that can accelerate successful digitization and compliance with LC standards.

From an administrative standpoint, this is a discretionary federal funding opportunity issued by NEH under CFDA 45.149, offered as a cooperative agreement, which typically implies a more active federal role in oversight and coordination compared to a standard grant. Eligible applicants are broad and include state, county, and local governments; special district governments; public and state-controlled institutions of higher education; private institutions of higher education; federally recognized Native American tribal governments; and nonprofit organizations with 501(c)(3) status (other than institutions of higher education). The listed award ceiling is $325,000 for the opportunity described, and the original closing date for the referenced cycle was January 15, 2019, with the opportunity created on November 20, 2018. The core purpose remains consistent regardless of cycle: to digitize and deliver high-quality, standards-compliant, rights-cleared historic newspaper pages that become part of a free, permanent national resource maintained by the Library of Congress.

• The National Endowment for the Humanities in the humanities sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "National Digital Newspaper Program" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 45.149.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2018-11-20.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2019-01-15. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $325,000.00 in funding.
• Eligible applicants include: State governments, County governments, City or township governments, Special district governments, Public and State controlled institutions of higher education, Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized), Nonprofits having a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Private institutions of higher education.

Apply for 20190115 PJ

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