<?php

    $dbh=mysql_connect ("localhost", "username", "password") or die ('I cannot connect to the database because: ' . mysql_error());
    mysql_select_db ("mydatabase");
 			
    // get the id from the URL request
    $id = $_REQUEST['id'];

    // retrieve the row from the database
    $query = "SELECT * FROM archive WHERE id='$id'";
   
    $result = mysql_query( $query );

    // print out the results
    if( $result && $newsitem = mysql_fetch_object( $result ) )
    {
      // print out the info
      $newsdate = $newsitem -> newsdate;
      $newssummary = $newsitem -> newssummary;
      $newstext = $newsitem -> newstext;

      echo '<p>' . $newsdate . '<br />' . '<strong>' . 
			$newssummary . '</strong>' . '<br />' . $newstext . '</p>';
			}
			
			// special characters
			$newssummary = htmlspecialchars($newssummary);
			$newstext = htmlspecialchars($newstext);
      			
			// hyperlinks
			$newstext = eregi_replace (
			 '\\[L]([-_./a-z0-9!&%#?+,\'=:;@~]+)\\[EL]',
			 '<a href="\\1">\\2</a>', $newstext);

                       // added this bit in to create line breaks
                      function br2nl($str) {
                      $str = preg_replace("/(\r\n|\n|\r)/", "", $str);
                      return preg_replace("=<br */?>=i", "\n", $str);
                      }

?>

$newstext = nl2br($newstext);