UC Berkeley now has access to both the Scientific American Archive (1845-2005) and Scientific American Supplement & Builders Archive Collection, which were licensed by the California Digital Library. CDL shared this information about the resource:
“Scientific American is the “oldest continually published magazine in the U.S.” Thus, its archive is an amazing resource, providing a wealth of historic information in all areas of science and technology. The coverage, going back to the first four-page issue published in 1845, and the quality of the documents–both text and images–is excellent. The archive is divided into four segments, 2005-1993, 1992-1948, 1947-1910, and 1909-1845, and includes some 133,000 articles. Good-quality PDFs are available for the entire archive; users can even browse an entire issue as a PDF file. There are options for both basic and advanced searching via Nature.com’s interface. Since the coverage goes back more than 160 years, the archive contains interesting articles by or about many noted scientists. For example, a 1955 issue of Scientific American features an interview with Albert Einstein, and there are articles by and about Linus Pauling, Francis Crick, and James Watson, to name a few.
“Additionally, the Supplement & Builders Archive Collection has also been licensed. The recently digitized Scientific American Supplement & Builders Archive Collection provides access to more than 2,500 issues from the Supplement and Builders publications. Together, these five collections provide unique insight into historic breakthroughs in science, technology, medicine and architecture.”