Back to Anglia Ruskin Library I started back working at Anglia Ruskin University Library in late September. In many ways this is my favourite library at the moment. That is mainly because it offers an experience that is closest to the pre-covid days. Unlike the Lockdown experience at some other libraries the shelves are open…

Steam Engines, Ships and Poetry Percy Shelley is mainly remembered as an idealistic, revolutionary son of a baronet. Shelley is seen as a vegetarian poet that eloped twice and then drowned aged 29. On the face of it Shelley seems an unlikely person to build a steam engine and a steam ship. Mary Shelley wrote…

I got a booking from 11 am until 3pm at Cambridge University Library! After seven months away it was very good to be back. I had been hanging around outside for the past few weeks just to get access to the digital resources. In the good weather it was fine as I was largely on…

What a relief to get back to the British Library. Six months away! I’ve felt it and I didn’t realise just how essential to my life a library was. At the time of writing Cambridge University Library is open only for collection and it’s the same story with the ARU library as well as Cambridgeshire…

Statue of James Watt, George Square, Glasgow.

At Sheffield Archives At Sheffield Archives I looked at documents concerning the city’s first Mechanics’ Library (1823) and Mechanics’ Institute (1832).  I consulted the Minute Books and also posters advertising Institute exhibitions from all over the North and Midlands of England. Some of them are reproduced here, and are from 1823 until around 1850. Many…

Entrance to the old Suffolk Record Office