This week, for Local and Community History Month, Librarian Antony Ramm offers a brief update to a previous article exploring the histories of communities around the wider Leeds area…

Back in May 2022 we published a piece here on the Secret Library Leeds blog that explored the depth and breadth of the local history material we hold at the Central Library outside the the city centre itself: that is, the places people live, their local communities – whether that be areas immediately outside the shopping and business district, whose old boundaries have blended to a certain extent with that centre (e.g. Woodhouse), or those towns and villages much further afield and which have retained some semblance of a distinct identity (e.g. Morley, Farsley, Wetherby, Garforth, Rothwell). Our Local and Family History department holds many thousands of important and very interesting materials telling the stories of everywhere around Leeds.

We explained as well that we had been busy at work creating a series of research guides listing what we consider to be the ‘best’ stock we hold for each of those areas. At the time, the only areas covered by those guides were Armley and Harehills (the result of some location-specific projects we had been involved in before 2022), together with the just-completed Rothwell guide; now, however, two-years on, we’re pleased to offer a partial update, and announce the completion and publication of four more guides, covering Horsforth, Hunslet & Holbeck, LS6, and Otley. You can access all the guides through the image links below, or on our full research guide collection page.

The Horsforth guide has already featured on these pages, when its creator, Library and Digital Assistant Jan Pinder, offered a wonderful look at some of the many highlights from the rich history of that town. We’re hoping to publish more articles like Jan’s in the coming weeks and months, ones that will offer a similar deep dive into the stories and library collections covering those four new areas.

Similarly, this isn’t the end of this ongoing project – staff continue to busily work at guides exploring more areas, including Barwich, Garforth, Guiseley, Morley, Pudsey, Wetherby, and Yeadon. Keep an eye out for those guides (and more beyond).

Contact our Local and Family History department to find out more about any of the guides featured here: 0113 37 86982 or localandfamilyhistory@leeds.gov.uk

The featured image on this page is taken from our Leodis archive and shows an unidentified road somewhere around Leeds, c.1906. Do you know this location? Get in touch if so!