New Website Launched To Preserve Grenville History

by: David Graham

Published: October, 2026

Editor's note: This article makes all researchers of Thousand Islands History smile! In fact, some may do a happy dance, because knowing where to find information is half the battle. My appreciation to David Graham and his confreres for allowing us to publicize this important news.

New Website launched to Preserve Grenville County History

Be sure to check out the new Digital Newspaper Archive, at the Grenville County Historical Society.

The Grenville County Historical Society has launched a new website housing an archive of newspapers dating back to 1895. This archive is important because it preserves the documentary history of the county and also mitigates an urgent risk. The old newspapers are crumbling. If these assets were not digitized and made searchable, a window on our past would be closed.

GCHS directors identified this crucial need and set out a plan to digitize and store the searchable information online, to be seen forever with access to all. To pay for it, a grant of nearly $50 thousand dollars was obtained from the Government of Canada through Library and Archives Canada. (Documentary Heritage Communities Program)

A key part of winning the federal grant was coming up with a plan to future-proof the collection. The new website https://vitacollections.ca/grenville-county-newspapers/search is hosted by Our Digital World, a non-profit based in Toronto.

“Our Digital World works with many communities on similar projects to ours. They are committed to updating their housing and search technology as time passes. And to safe guard the sustainability of our archive, we have deposited external hard drive copies with organizations such as the Ontario Historical Society, the Ontario Ancestors (Leeds and Grenville Branch) and the Prescott Public Library.”

The site is linked to the Ontario Community Newspaper portal https://news.ourontario.ca/ for wider-reaching search options available to the residents of Grenville.

GCHS President Jane Ramsay says,

“We have reached out to indigenous and French Canadian communities within Grenville County to let them know this new service is available. This new archive site really improves our service for researchers or interested community members. Instead of having to show up in person to look through papers at an archive that is open one day a week, you can now do a key word search on line from the comfort of your home or office.”

Roughly half of the GCHS collection of 75,000 newspapers has been digitized and housed. The next project for the Society is to preserve more Prescott Journals and other publications such as the Prescott County Telegraph, Prescott Messenger and Grenville County Advertiser. The goal, of course, is to ensure our county history is easily accessible to current and future generations.

Note: Links in place to date:

Grenville County Ontario Digital Newspaper Archive
Grenville County Historical Society Facebook
Edward Jessup Branch UELAC
Leeds & Grenville Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society
Ottawa Branch of the Ontario Genealogical
Ontario Historical Society

By David Graham

David Graham is currently president of the Grenville County Historical Society and editor of their informative Newsletters and Website. David encourages those doing family research to take advantage of their resources.

The Grenville County Historical Society with its impressive archives is located in the old Prescott Railway station. This is now a National Historic Site and was built in 1855 and was part of the Grand Trunk Railway. It is located at 500 Railway Street in Prescott.

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