The American Citizen (Omaha, Neb.)
Historic newspapers carry the language, views and graphic reporting of their time, including racist content. They are shown to teen and adult profiles.
959 issues from 1938 to 1959, published in Omaha, Nebraska, digitised for Chronicling America.
Touted in the masthead as the "Official organ of the 'Order Sons of Italy' in America," the American Citizen was the primary newspaper dedicated to the Italian American community of Omaha, Nebraska. The Sons of Italy was a fraternal organization with the stated goal of assisting Italian immigrants to become productive American citizens. The American Citizen was a vital part of this mission, and it described itself as, "A weekly newspaper devoted to Americanization, Education, and Problems of Peace."
The late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries saw a vast influx of Italian immigrants to Nebraska. Not only did they settle almost exclusively in a single town, Omaha, but most had emigrated from a single town. Of the 60,000 Omahans claiming Italian heritage in 2021, nearly two-thirds traced their origins to the town of Carlentini, Sicily. Drawn by promises of employment with the Union Pacific railroad, these immigrants built a community of expatriates, complete with organizations like the Sons of Italy and the American Italian Heritage Society, which provided aid to new arrivals in cases of sickness, death, or unemployment.
In the years preceding and following World War I, there was an explosion of Italian-centric newspapers in Omaha. The majority of these papers, including the American Citizen, were written in Italian, save for the occasional article or ad placement in English. Most opened and closed in the span of a few years. The American Citizen proved to be the…
- Genres
- News
- Published in
- Omaha, Nebraska, United States
- Collection
- Chronicling America
- Licence or status
- None stated by the archive
- Rights
- The Library of Congress believes that the newspapers in Chronicling America are in the public domain or have no known copyright restrictions. Newspapers published in the United States more than 95 years ago are in the public domain in their entirety.
- Credit
- Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers, Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities
- Who can read it
- Teens profiles and older (placed by Invisible Network from what the archive says; archives give no ratings)
- Archive
- Library of Congress