Here is how this website came to be. I began collecting Newman quotations over 50 years ago in graduate school when I read Newman's Idea of a University while thinking about liberal education. About 15 years later, after I had entered the Catholic Church, I came upon an article in Our Sunday Visitor promoting the cause for sainthood of Cardinal Newman. I recognized the name, was taken with the story of his life, and began collecting and marking-up every Newman work I could obtain, starting with his Parochial and Plain Sermons from Ignatius Press.

In 1998 I was browsing the religion section of a university library and came upon the complete 40-volume standard edition of Newman's works. I had been studying website development, and at the end of the course the instructor had exhorted us to put something worthwhile on the Internet: I was struck immediately with the idea of making that whole Newman collection available to the Internet world, and to that end launched the NewmanReader.org website in 2000.

When work on the website was completed in 2003, I donated it to the recently-formed National Institute for Newman Studies (NINS), in order to ensure that the website had a lasting home and to help promote the fledgling organization. I'm delighted that NINS still makes the website available over 20 years later.

The announcement of Blessed Newman's coming canonization in 2019 motivated me to search the Internet to see what had been added since the creation of Newman Reader. I found so much more available in the way of copies of original documents that I decided to create this website and an accompanying eBook to promote access to the new resources. Completion became possible in 2021 when the NINS finished making available all 32 volumes of Newman's Letters and Diaries in their Digital Collections.

Newman materials have never been more readily available. I hope this website has helped you to access and to appreciate them, and him.

Bob Elder

9 October 2025

email: NewmanGuide@gmail.com