Local History Collection
Guide to the Collection
Somerville Materials
These books and pamphlets are arranged in the same Dewey Decimal order as the regular collection, with a couple of anomalies:
- The call number for all Somerville materials in the Local History Room starts with an “S” for Somerville.
- Any trailing zeros in the call number have been omitted.
- For example, “S010” is shortened to “S01”; “S200” becomes “S2”, and so on.
Historic Somerville Digital Collections
- SPL Collections on Digital Commonwealth (opens new tab) – Includes Somerville photographs and ephemera from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
- Historic Somerville Photos (opens new tab) – A curated collection of historic Somerville photos posted on Flickr.
- SPL Materials on the Internet Archive (opens new tab) – Maps, photographs and texts including Revolutionary War maps, photographs of public art, environmental reports, and City Annual Reports from the 19th and early 20th centuries.
- Public Art in Somerville (opens new tab): View a gallery of examples of the city’s rich tradition of public art.
- Historic Buildings (opens new tab): Photographs of Somerville’s architectural heritage, with a particular emphasis on the turn of the century building boom.
- Historic Maps (opens new tab): Maps of the city and surrounding areas, including maps of the site of the Battle of Bunker Hill.
- Environmental Reports (opens new tab): Reports on previous and current efforts to repair the environmental damage of Somerville’s industrial past.
- Walking Tours of Somerville (opens new tab) – A variety of walking tours of different areas of Somerville, produced by Somerville City TV.
- Digitized Somerville Newspapers – Features a complete searchable archive of Somerville newspapers from 1870 to 1996.
- Somerville Journal (opens new tab): First published in 1870, The Somerville Journal was the city’s primary newspaper until it was merged with The Medford Transcript in 2022.
- Somerville Community News (opens new tab): The Somerville Community News was an all-volunteer newspaper that covered city events from a progressive perspective from 1977 to 1996.
Major Resources
Somerville Annual Reports
- In the library: paper copies from 1844 to the present (opens new tab).
- Reports are also available electronically via Internet Archive (opens new tab). Published every year by the city, these include statistical and status reports from departments within the city government.
Somerville City Directories
- Charlestown City Directories, 1834-1874. Microfilm Cabinet. Until 1842 Somerville was officially part of Charlestown.
- Somerville City Directories, (1851-1933, 1939-present) Organized by name from 1851-1933. Organized by ward, precinct and address from 1939 to the present.
- Somerville City Directories available online – scroll down for links to digitized directories from 1869-1919.
Somerville Poll Tax Directories
- 1887-1938 (microfilm only). Published by the city, this is a list of city residents, arranged by Ward and Precinct, then street address. Before 1920, only men were listed.
Somerville Student Magazines and Yearbooks
- Somerville High School Radiator (opens new tab) (1898-2016 available online)
- Paper and microfilm versions of the student magazines and yearbooks for the Somerville High School Radiator, the Somerville Trade High School Trade Winds and the magazines for the Southern, Western, and Northeastern Junior High Schools from 1882-1884 and 1895-Present.
United States Census
- 1790-1910 censuses are available on microfilm in the local history room and 1790-1940 censuses are available online via HeritageQuest (opens new tab) and Ancestry (opens new tab).
Somerville and Boston Area Phone Directories
- 1911-Present, with some gaps. Paper and microfilm copies are available in the local history room.
Atlases & Maps
- Map of Ten Hills of Somerville, 1637
- Somerville Map, 1852
- Atlas of the City of Somerville, 1874
- Atlas of the City of Somerville, 1884
- Sanborn Fire Insurance Map, 1900 (on microfilm)
- Sanborn Fire Insurance Map, circa 1933-1940s.
- Sanborn Maps for 1900 and circa 1933-1940s available online (remote access for Somerville residents) through the database Digital Sanborn Maps of MA 1867-1971 (opens new tab).
Local Newspapers
Digitized Somerville Newspapers
- Somerville Journal (opens new tab): First published in 1870, The Somerville Journal was the city’s primary newspaper until it was merged with The Medford Transcript in 2022.
- Somerville Community News (opens new tab): The Somerville Community News was an all-volunteer newspaper that covered city events from a progressive perspective from 1977 to 1996.
The library has copies of the following papers on microfilm.
- Somerville Journal, 1876 to present
- Somerville Reporter, 1904-1913
- Somerville News, 1893, 1913-1916
- Somerville Citizen-Democrat, 1932
- West Somerville Reporter & Cambridge World, 1900-1901
Library staff maintains indexes to the Somerville Journal including a subject index for noteworthy topics and events and an obituary index. Researchers should check the paper card catalog files for all subjects prior to 1990.