Otis Library is the principal repository for the archives of the Norwich Bulletin. Through its many iterations, the Bulletin traces its origins to 1791, when Ebenezer Bushnell founded the Weekly Register (1791–1795). From these modest beginnings, and through numerous name changes by the early twentieth century, the paper grew into what was arguably the dominant newspaper in eastern Connecticut. According to the Library of Congress, in 1910 the Norwich Bulletin advertised that it had the largest circulation of any newspaper in the region, with readers in “forty-nine towns, one hundred and sixty-five postal districts, and forty-one Rural Free Delivery routes.” The editors claimed that a subscription base of approximately 7,000 translated into nearly 40,000 daily readers.

Historically a Republican newspaper, the Bulletin explicitly courted two core constituencies: residents of small towns, villages, and rural areas in eastern Connecticut and adjacent Rhode Island, and the banking, industrial, and commercial elite based in Norwich itself. Otis Library houses both microfilm and bound volumes of the Bulletin, as well as the invaluable Bulletin clipping files. Organized by subject and individual, these files contain extensive detailed information and served as essential research tools in the pre-digital era, providing background material and source references unavailable elsewhere.