Over the next few weeks we’ll be posting a few more articles than usual, all tied to our exhibition Leodis: 400 Years of Leeds in the Leeds Libraries Collections. The exhibition can be seen in our City Library until November 11. In this post our focus is on the history of Leeds Libraries and the Leeds Tercentenary in 1926.

The main part of our Leeds 400 exhibition is in the exhibition space on the first floor of the city library, however don’t miss out on taking a trip up to the second floor to the Heritage and Research department to see the second community cabinet and items from the history of Leeds Libraries and Leeds 300!

Throughout Leeds Libraries’ almost 150 year history we’ve not only collected books and ephemera on subjects relating to anything you can imagine, we’ve also been collecting information about and made by ourselves! In the Heritage and Research Library we have several volumes of news cuttings from local newspapers all about the library service, from the opening of the City Library in 1884 until the mid 20th Century. We have collections of reading guides, library magazines, newsletters and photographs from our long gone Book Binding department (along with hundreds of photographs of all our libraries on Leodis). We even have copies of our children’s pamphlet The Chimney Corner produced by Children’s Librarian Maud Hummerston in the 1930s, along with a 2026 edition made by our current children’s team.

In Leeds we are lucky enough to have produced some infamous authors all of which are represented in the Heritage and Research department. On display we have a letter written to Armley Library by Alan Bennett thanking them for hosting him when he visited in 2016.

Not only did Librarians of the past keep information about the library service, but they also carefully recorded big events in the city through news cuttings. Leeds City Library is old enough to have been a thriving service in the 1920s when Leeds 300 was a big event! Library staff in 1926 diligently cut out, stuck and bound hundreds of articles relating to the Leeds Tercentenary in a volume still kept in the department today. Our Tercentenary news cuttings are on display as well as items relating to the big event including newspaper special editions, photo albums and commemorative booklets from concerts and church services in the city.

This part of the exhibition is in the Heritage and Research department on the second floor of Leeds City Library.