Google Books has begun to partner with publishers to digitize the back issues of magazines and offer them online. As part of this initiative, the entire run of Life magazine—over 1,860 issues from 1936 to 1972—has been digitized. Even though the library has issues of Life in bound volumes, it’s really fun to browse through this online collection and see the variety of topics covered by the magazine (the Berlin Airlift, the Olympics, John F. Kennedy’s assassination, and the Beatles to name just a few) as well as view the many photos that were the hallmark of Life. Issues are searchable, and, through thumbnail view, you can see all the pages in a given issue.
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