The National Library of Finland has reached another milestone: it has now digitised all Finnish newspapers published in the 1940s. The newspapers offer a glimpse into an interesting turning point in Finnish history: the period after the Continuation War and the post-war ‘years of danger’ from 1944 to 1948 when issues covered in the press included the terms of peace, the Finnish weapons cache case and the Soviet-led Allied Control Commission in Finland.
In the 1940s over 200 Finnish-language newspaper titles were published, with a combined total of some 1.4 million pages. “We are pleased to add more newspaper material to our digi.kansalliskirjasto.fi service. The 1940s were an interesting phase of Finnish history, and the digitisation of the material provides many new opportunities for its use,” says Director of Services Johanna Lilja. Swedish-language newspapers were digitised earlier with separate project funding under an agreement with the copyright management organisation Kopiosto. This means that both Finnish- and Swedish-language newspapers are now available in the digi.kansalliskirjasto.fi service.
Tutkain agreement enables remote research use of Finnish 1940s newspapers
As Finnish-language newspaper content from the 1940s is partially protected by copyright, the National Library cannot make it openly available online. However, the online research use of newspapers published until the end of 2021 is permitted to researchers and both seminar and master’s thesis students. This right is based on the Tutkain agreement concluded by the National Library, Kopiosto and Finnish higher education institutions. The agreement provides a foundation for research using digital methods.
For Finnish-language newspapers, open online use is possible for those published until the end of 1939. In addition, the National Library’s digital material can be accessed in full at legal deposit libraries, where anyone can study, for example, the digitised newspapers from the 1940s.
The digitisation of newspapers has continued at the National Library since the 1990s. At present, almost 20 million pages of newspapers are available in the digi.kansalliskirjasto.fi service. We are currently digitising newspapers issued in the 1950s.