Rare Book Round Up – Illustrious Illustrations

Each week our Collections Manager Rhian, brings you our ‘Rare Book of the Week’ on our social media accounts, too good to be lost in the daily deluge of tweets and Instagrams we wanted to bring you a round-up of some of our favourites. This week it’s the turn our beloved illustrated beauties. We’ll begin…

Rare Book Round Up – Lockdown Special

Each week our Collections Manager Rhian, brings you our ‘Rare Book of the Week’ on our social media accounts, too good to be lost in the daily deluge of tweets and Instagrams we wanted to bring you a round-up of some of our favourites.  With libraries dating back to the 1800s we’ve got an awful…

I am the merry-go-round horse dragging up the earth beneath me. Part 1

This week on the Secret Library we hear from Dr Charlotte Cullen. Charlotte, who is an artist, researcher, serf member and lecturer in Fine Art at York St John University, has been working with the Leeds Central Library Collections during lockdown with a focus on Armley to create newly inspired artwork. This project has been…

The Theatrical Life of Tate Wilkinson

On the Secret Library this week we have a article from guest writer Dominique Trigg, the creator of Some Sources Say, who has written about the fascinating  life of Tate Wilkinson, an Eighteenth Century pioneer of Leeds Theatre. If you would like to read more excellent articles from Dominique then you should visit Some Sources…

The Mysterious Ms. Morgan

This week we hear from Ross Horsley, who introduces us to a curiously little-known crime novelist of the 1940s, whose best-known book has a Yorkshire connection… Back in the 1940s, at an isolated Yorkshire mansion, a murder took place that might have gone undiscovered were it not for the interventions of Dylis Hughes, a travelling…

Hiding in plain sight: my search for the old cinemas of Leeds

This week our guest writer is Dr Laura Ager, Academic researcher and Creative Engagement Officer at the Hyde Park Picture House, who is writing about the history of old cinemas in Leeds. Before the era of the corporate multiplex cinema began, Leeds used to have many different and unique small cinemas. I have read that at…

The Leeds Savage Club: A Brief History

This week on the Secret Library, we hear from Karen Downham in our Local and Family History department, who looks at the Leeds Savage Club, a group active in the early 1900s, and whose members had a strong influence on the city of Leeds, and beyond.  January 2020: Since the publication of this article, Karen…