Recent updates to the Iola Register’s digital archives offer subscribers an even richer treasure trove of local history to explore.
Thanks to a partnership with the Kansas Historical Society, the years 1965-1970 and 2001-2014 have now been digitized and can be accessed at iolaregister.com/archives. Beginning in 2015, the Register has uploaded daily editions to its website.
An astonishing 348,550 pages of the Register are now available online. Subscribers can browse by date, search by keyword, and download pages of the paper.
Two small omissions remain: July-December 1965 and January-June of 1970. The hope is to include those segments in the coming months. Those gaps aside, digital editions of the Register date back to 1875, when the Register was published every Saturday. An annual subscription cost $2.
Key to the digitization effort were Dylan Sweyko-Kuhlman, digital archivist for the Kansas Historical Society, and Michael Church, Senior Archivist of Collections.
“Digitizing the Iola Register is an important project for the Kansas Historical Society,” said Sweyko-Kuhlman. “It helps us achieve the two main goals in archiving: preservation and access.”
The Register’s microfilm and physical copies are now stored in the Historical Society’s permanent collection — whose climate-controlled and fireproof storage conditions are far superior to those in the Register building.
Highlights from the updated collection include coverage of the 2007 flood, which devastated much of Allen County. An article from July 2, 2007 documented the efforts of the American Red Cross to set up an emergency shelter at Allen Community College for about 60 evacuees. More than 17 inches of rain fell on Iola in just five days.
The front page of Wednesday, Nov. 3, 2010 celebrates the approval of a quarter-cent sales tax in Allen County, which was used to build Allen County Regional Hospital. The measure passed by a vote of 3,221 to 1,221. “It’s a visionary — and necessary — decision,” said Jim Gilpin, who served as co-chairman of the Yes! Allen County Healthcare initiative. “It means hope,” said Craig Neuenswander, then superintendent of USD 257 schools.
And then there are the articles hidden behind the headlines, the daily documentation of life in Allen County, the stories that tie so many of us together. Several articles in the summer of 2005 cover the creation of the Elm Creek Community Garden on land donated by Val and Carolyn McLean. The 20-acre garden was then gifted to the Humanity House in 2018 and now produces tons of fresh vegetables each year. “We’ll see how it grows,” said Val McLean at the time. “We wanted to start slow and see the interest level.” Slow and steady certainly wins the race.
Kansas Historical Society’s Michael Church reflected on the importance of the digital archives. “The Iola Register digitization provides the Iola community and Kansas students, teachers, genealogists and historians an unprecedented opportunity to rediscover their local, Kansas and U.S. history through the local press,” he said. Here at the daily paper, we couldn’t agree more.
ONCE the digitization of 1875-2014 is complete, the Register plans to digitize earlier years of publication dating back to 1868. Those early years are essential in documenting the formation of Iola, elected seat of Allen County in 1865, and the county as a whole. They also include, as local historian Clyde Toland has noted, coverage of the Grasshopper Plague of 1874, which devastated much of the Great Plains.
Microfilm which dates back to 1868 also records the Register’s various stages of evolution.
The Iola Register was founded in 1867 as the Allen County Courant, changing its name in 1868 to the Neosho Valley Register and in 1875 to the Iola Register.
