Interesting that you mention the old newspapers. I was just getting back here about those archives.
Many states have their old newspapers on the internet. Some states are better than others. New York state is very good.
http://nyshistoricnewspapers.org
It’s possible to go back and very easily look at newspapers from 1850 and 1860. In the olden days the newspapers covered local news. Each little village might have its own column and it posted local news such as, Mrs. Smith has the flu or Mr. Jones hitched up the wagons and traveled into Binghamton, Mr. Ryan fell off the hay wagon, or the Fiskes had a pie social at their house Saturday night.
The newspapers also have a great source of information about births, deaths and marriages. The obituaries are the best. They tell how many children, give their names and best of all give the cities in which they now live.
It was in these old newspapers I learned that my g.g.grandfather got married after his wife of 45 years died. I had no idea, certainly not from my relatives. That marriage, BTW, was never mentioned in his obit and he was buried with his first wife.
Back before newspaper archives online, my husband got me a large microfilm reading that would go directly into our computer. NY State Archives sent microfilm of the 1700s newspapers and I spent a year in a tiny room from waking to sleeping living in a time when George Washington was spoken of in the present tense. It was priceless research I was doing for Night Before Christmas. Besides tracking down every person that ever interacted with Henry Livingston, I was having to identify which newspaper poems would be his based on pseudonym or style. Learned a MASSIVE amount about pseudonyms out of that year.