Ocean County Newspapers

The Courier was the main Toms River based weekly for Ocean County. Originally the Ocean Signal from 1850 to December 1852, then the Ocean Emblem until 1868, it was published until bought out by the Observer in the 1980s. Its coverage spanned the entire county, even some Tuckerton area news when Tuckerton was still part of Burlington County. The news came primarily from outside correspondents, which means that if no one sent the editor news, none got printed. Coverage becomes more focused on the Toms River region after the 1920s, but still fairly regular submissions from most of the county. Coverage of Lakewood seems to have lessened greatly as the Bricksburg/Lakewood Times and Journal grew after the turn of the century. [Scott Peters, OCHS]

The Ocean County Library has an extensive collection of old newspapers for Ocean County. The Periodicals section has available, on microfilm, the New York Times from 1851 to the present, the Asbury Park Press from 1905 to the present, and the Ocean County Observer from 1969 to the present. Area newspapers (Toms River, Lakewood, Tuckerton, Seaside Heights, Beach Haven and Manasquan) on microfilm. Years covered range from the 1850s to the 1980s depending on the title.

An extremely thorough clipping file related to subjects of interest in the area provides instant access to subjects of local interest, covered in area newspapers which were not indexed at the time. The clipping file includes persons and places of importance or interest and deals with subjects as varied as the political scandals of Manchester Township and the Robert Marshall murder case (written about by Joe McGinniss in the book "Blind Faith"), and provides coverage back to the 1930s in some cases, and to the 1960s in most cases. This invaluable resource has been tapped by lawyers, television stations, historians, environmentalists and newspaper reporters themselves.