I've recently been focusing on profiles relating to the Isle of Man and have found the (free) newspaper archive on the imuseum.im website (hosted by Manx National Heritage) to be extremely useful. It has good coverage from early 19th C to mid 20th C. Sometimes there are items submitted by relatives that are about those who have left the Isle of Man.
A good example is Captain George Maddrell, a master mariner - apart from baptism, marriage & death, he only appears in 2 census returns I could find (mentioned in births/baptisms for children as father, but no evidence he was present), but the newspapers provide a wealth of detail.
