Current 19th Century Newspaper Thinking

["Robert R. Shields" <rshi@loc.gov>]

Dear Fellow Ex-Librans,

	With much deliberation, the Library of Congress, in its infinite
wisdom, has determined that after 23 years in Rare Books, the only place I
am qualified to work is in  the Serial and Government Publications
Division where I currently provide reference service.  I have just
returned from our storage warehouse where we keep acres and acres of 19th
century newspapers.  My new assignment requires me to determine which
issues we have on microfilm so that we can safely discard the originals.
These are my questions :  

Are other libraries discarding their original 19th century newspapers?  If
not, what justification is being used to retain the originals?  Are there
libraries interested in acquiring 19th century newspapers? 

Thanks for any help or advice,

Rob Shields				rshi@loc.gov
Reference Specialist			202-707-2016
Serials and Government Publications
Library of Congress
Washington DC 20540