Old Papers

The late Oscar von Forckenbeck, high Prussian official, had a consuming passion: the collection of old newspapers and manuscripts. When he died in 1892 he left the fruits of 40 years of collecting--jour-nals in 43 languages from 32 countries. These were bequeathed to the municipality of Aix-la Chapelle which built upon the collection, until, last week, the Technical College at Aachen (formerly Aix-la Chapelle) opened to the public its Newspaper Museum. It contained 150,000 journals in nearly all languages. Oldest example is a copy of Neue Zeitung Tubingen of 1561. Most interesting U. S. item is a copy of The Constellation, believed to be the largest ever printed. It measured 50 in. by 35 in., had 13 columns to the page, contained numerous pictures, including one of President Buchanan. The Constellation was published in Manhattan on July 4, 1867 by one George Roberts. Other curios: one of the earliest Socialist journals (1849), printed on dark red paper; an Eskimo newspaper; a copy of the Cologne Volks-zeitung (1889) which presented a brief story of the 100th anniversary of the firm of Solomon Oppenheimer, printed in letters of gold.

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