Digital Library of Historical Directories, 1750-1919: Dorset, Hampshire and Wiltshire, 1903-1916

<P>Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.</P><p>The aim of the project was to improve access to local and trade directories for the period 1750-1919 by making a substantial collection of English and Welsh directories available online as a Digital Library of Historical Directories.<br> This digital resource comprises in total some 600 directories, covering every English county together with Wales, and ranging widely over the period 1750-1919 (the latter cut-off point chosen for copyright reasons).

There is a particular focus on the 1850s, 1890s and 1910s, with at least one directory provided for each county in each of these decades.<br> The digitisation of the volumes involved a two-stage process, in which (1) the hard-copy source was scanned to produce a graphic image of each page, and then (2) those images were processed using OCR software to generate a machine-readable text file.</p><p><br></p><p>An <a href="specialcollections.le.ac.uk/digital/collection/p16445coll4" target="_blank">online version</a> of this resource can be found on the Website of the University of Leicester.<br> <br> <br> </p>