Introduction

The ANP-project involves digitizing about 1.5 million typed news items that were originally used by newsreaders of the Dutch ‘Radionieuwsdienst’ (Radio News Service), that was part of the ‘Algemeen Nederlands Persbureau’ (Netherlands national news agency) founded in 1934. In 1993 the Koninklijke Bibliotheek acquired the typoscripts of the ANP-bulletins from 1937 to 1989. At that time the original material was stored in the basement of a building in the Mediapark in Hilversum and threatened with destruction. In 2006 the KB launched the idea to digitize the materials and make them online available. The project is jointly financed by the Memory of the Netherlands and the KB. ANP is involved in the project as a ‘content’ partner

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ANP news items are characterized by their conciseness and huge informational compactness. The original messages often include handwritten notes from the newsreaders and instructions for the suitability of specific extracts in relation to the specific broadcasters. Radio has long been the most up-to-date medium in the field of news distribution. Even more than newspapers and television journals the ANP news items reflect the development of news, short, factual and sometimes even from hour to hour. The German attack on Poland of 1 September 1939, the North Sea flood of 1 February 1953 and the murder on Kennedy of 22 November 1963 can be traced step by step. As a national press agency ANP held a monopoly position for years and gained a reputation as the primary resource for news on politics and the royal house.

Planning

The project took off at 1 April 2007. The material in the approximately 750 moving boxes has been de-stapled, organized, scanned, OCRed and then stored in acid free boxes. At October 2008 it is available online, as part of the KB-website. It will be possible to perform full-text searches through all news items. Also, the news items can be consulted per date and year.

For more information

Edwin Klijn