Today we go online and google what we're looking for - and sure enough we'll find the information - and a whole lot of it may be questionable. Years ago, most newspapers had the information about what is going on in town. Sure some of it might not have the facts correct, or be an ad disguised as news - but oh the things there are to learn about the family in the newspaper.
Try looking for those missing facts in the paper of the day. Most my family tree comes from New York. NY is a state where getting information is difficult at best. I find much of my information in the local news columns of the past. Most often i use the search for "Firstname Lastname" with the quote marks included.
Free resources online -
Try http://fultonhistory.com/Fulton.html which covers all of NY - an a little of other places. Read the FAQs section which is the link down at the bottom in the scrolling messages, it will assist you in the searching.
Or for those of us in the Hudson Valley, there is https://news.hrvh.org/ which is a smaller resource but seems to have different papers. Putnam County Courier used to be on its own website, but it has been added here and is much more searchable this way.
Any county in New York, can be searched at the NY Historic Newspapers website, and you can search one or multiple counties at the same time if you choose. Open each search result in a new tab here, which makes it easier to go back to your original search.
For a wider network, there is the Chronicling America website Which runs 1789 to 1963 all over the United States in various papers. The advanced search options here will give you better searches.
For other newspaper resources look at Cyndi'sList to see if there are better newspapers for your area of interest that are free. Ifyou're ready to pay for your searches, there are many susbscription services as well, like Newspapers.com.