September 9, 2017

While an online newspaper database can be a goldmine for film research, foreign newspaper archives can provide both research information and photo images not easily found elsewhere. Newspapers.com contain a few foreign newspapers from countries like the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and Ireland - primarily English-language newspapers - but what it does not contain are newspapers from nations such as France, Spain or Germany. Databases such as International Coalition on Newspapers (ICON), Biblioteca Virtual de Prensa Histórica (Spain), Biblioteca Digital das Artes do Espetáculo (Brazil), and Biblioteca Nacional de España are just a handful of online newspaper archives useful for film research. In particular, the ones in Spain and Brazil are especially helpful in researching information about American-made western films. For example, the subject researched might be a westerns silent-film star like Tom Tyler, and the database to be searched is Biblioteca Digital das Artes Artes do Espetáculo. To run a search, the tab to click on is "pesquisa", or Brazilian Portuguese for "Search". The results show up, in this case a link to Cineart, dated April 4, 1928:

Here we have a nice photo of Tom with his director Robert de Lacey, along with an article describing how Tom Tyler was selected to succeed western silent film star Fred Thomson at Film Booking Office (FBO) studios:

While the textual information is in fact general and can be found in English language sources, the photo of Tom and his director is rare for that time period. 1928 is a significant year for Tom, not just as an actor, but also in his career as a heavyweight weightlifting champion, when he won the AAU championship. As can be seen in the photo, Tom has a magnificent athletic build, in addition to his infectious smile.

It is important to search as many online newspaper sources as possible, regardless of what language the newspaper is in. Articles can always be translated, and the title of the newspaper itself, such as Heraldo de Madrid, is an intriguing original source to list in any film written article.