For day 8 of our Advent Calendar, Librarian Helen Skilbeck shares her favourite heritage mince pie recipe with you all. Ann Peckham was from Leeds and wrote a book entitled ‘The complete English cook or prudent housewife’. Our copy shown here is the fourth edition dating from 1770. In her preface Peckham states – ‘the…
Category: Heritage Advent Calendar
Family Allowance Toy Fair
by Louise Birch Day 7 of our Advent Calendar is all about Christmas Shopping. there is a commercial side to Christmas that many dislike, for some this is due to the affordability of gifts. Today’s entry recalls a toy fair that addressed this. These images show the annual Wykebeck ‘Family allowance Toy Fair’. Local residents…
Victorian Scrapbook
By Jude Ramm, Library and Digital Assistant For day 6 of our Advent Calendar, we’ll turn the Christmas spirit up to eleven with our Victorian Scrapbook. This incredibly beautiful scrapbook was donated to the Art Library in the 1990s. It’s packed full of a variety of Christmas cards, scraps, and cut-outs from the Victorian era…
BlueBeard – Grand Pantomime
By Antony Ramm, Librarian ‘He’s Behind You’ – Day 5 of our Heritage Advent Calendar brings us everyone’s favourite seasonal theatre – Pantomimes. ‘Bluebeard’ and the Leeds pantomime scene go back a long way. While it may not have been the first-ever panto in the town, it was certainly the first at the most prestigious…
A Gledhow Military Hospital Christmas
Day 4 of our Advent Calendar brings us to the Christmas Celebrations at Gledhow Military Hospital. During the First World War, Gledhow Hall was offered for use as a Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD) hospital and run by the British Red Cross. This first image from 1917 shows one of the small huts in the grounds…
Winter Wear
For Day 3 of our Heritage Advent Calendar our Library & Digital Assistant Jude Ramm gives you… formal winter wear in ‘Hand Coloured Fashion Plates 1770-1899’ from the Sanderson Collection. Anyone would be hard pushed not to be the talk of the town in this beautiful ensemble. From the dainty shoes, complete with pom-poms, to…
Christmas Pudding
Day 2 of our Heritage & Special Collections Advent Calendar. Today librarian Helen Skilbeck has a Christmas Pudding recipe for you. Please let us know if you give it a go. The Leeds company Goodall, Backhouse and Co. produced a range of ‘household specialities’ including Yorkshire Relish, egg and custard powder, ginger beer powder, quinine…
Snowy Tramscapes by Peter Lapish
We’re kicking off the 2021 festive period with our Secret Library Leeds Advent Calendar. Everyday in the run up to Christmas we will bring you something from our heritage & special collections, all with a seasonal feel. Day 1 – Prints from the Leodis.net photographic archive as chosen by senior librarian Louise Birch Impressionistic watercolours…
The Secret Library | Leeds Libraries Heritage Blog 