Category: Partners
Books and Borrowing: A Retrospective
At this time of year, I normally write a blog based on Christmas borrowings from one of more of the libraries represented in the Books and Borrowing dataset. This year, however, I need to write something different. Astonishingly, we are now in the last few weeks of our funded period, and inching ever closer to […]
A Library Tour of Manchester
Reposted with permission from the Innerpeffray Library blog Back in December 2022, I headed to Manchester for a whirlwind day tour of some of its prestigious libraries! On the day I was lucky enough to take part in a tour of Chetham’s Library and spend a little time researching at the Portico Library. Unfortunately I […]
Creating Our (Fabulous!) Online Exhibition with the University of Edinburgh
The best laid plans… It’s there, listed in our ‘Pathways to Impact’ statement: exhibitions. Back then, before the pandemic, that meant in-person displays of materials relating to the Books and Borrowing project. Borrowing registers or receipt books, selected books from partners’ collections, and featured library users from each library perhaps. We were going to create […]
Event Report: Online Creative Writing Workshop: Books and Borrowing
On 31 August 2022, I had the pleasure of attending the Books and Borrowing Online Creative Writing Workshop, hosted in partnership with the National Library of Scotland, and led by the wonderful Linda Cracknell. The idea of the workshop was to inspire people to think about how they might use library borrowing records, and archival […]
A Visitor to Innerpeffray Library: Héloïse Russell-Fergusson
Reposted with permission from the Innerpeffray Library Blog’s ‘Visitor Vignettes’ series The Innerpeffray Library visitors’ books contain signatures and details of visitors to the library from 1859 to the present day – with each modern visitor adding to the living archive. By digitising and investigating the information within the visitors’ books, it is possible to […]
Why Do Libraries Matter?
This week, I’ve been reflecting on a theme which is, of course, very close to our Books and Borrowing hearts. Why do libraries matter? This was prompted by a conversation with the Chief Printer of the Pathfoot Press, project friend and supporter Kelsey Jackson Williams. Back in the dim ages of long ago (also known […]
Introducing the Chambers’ Library Map of Borrowers, 1827-1830
The Books and Borrowing team are pleased to announce the release of the Chambers’ Library Map of Borrowers, 1827-1830. What began as a quick experiment in georeferencing the borrower addresses recorded in the ledger of Robert Chambers’ Edinburgh circulating library has developed significantly over the past few months, thanks to the hard work of Brian […]
Event Report: Books and Borrowing: Edinburgh’s 19th Century Readers
On Thursday 23rd June, members of the Books and Borrowing team were joined by an online audience for an event highlighting our work on Edinburgh’s historic libraries. This session was hosted by the National Library of Scotland as part of their regular webinar series, and we’re grateful to the library as a whole, and particularly […]
Robert Simson’s Books at the University of Glasgow
One of the many delights of working on the Books and Borrowing project is the discovery and inclusion of more borrowing registers as we progress. From our original fourteen, we have gone to eighteen. Our latest arrival, the Simson Borrowing Register, is linked to the Glasgow University Library and we thank the Archives and Special […]
The Pirate, The Sea and a Cargo of Books
by Linda Cracknell The moral compass was already set when I launched North in May to run a creative writing workshop at the Orkney Library & Archive, Kirkwall, Orkney. The Books and Borrowing project had established that there was an enthusiastic readership in nineteenth-century Orkney for both local Mary Brunton’s best-selling novel of moral excellence, […]