Archive: 2018

1. 

   Weird and wonderful: Edwardian Christmas cards

   It’s at this time of year, when the annual festivities are almost upon us, that Library staff are inspired to consult the collections in search of something that captures the...

   7th December 2018 • Read more

2. 

   Belle Vue Miniature Railway – a beloved attraction remembered

   We’re grateful once more to Jon Cocks, our Special Correspondent Belle Vue ‘insider’ for taking time and trouble to write – and to illustrate with his original photos (no reuse...

   15th November 2018 • Read more

3. 

   Robert Rose, the Bard of Colour

   For a brief period in the nineteenth century Manchester’s leading literary watering hole was the Sun Inn, a timber-framed building located opposite the entrance to Chetham’s on Long Millgate. In...

   19th October 2018 • Read more

4. 

   An unusual acquisition

   Every so often the Library is compelled to acquire a book or a manuscript because it is so unusual and quite unlike anything else that we have. This large broadside,...

   5th October 2018 • Read more

5. 

   Accidental heroes – getting in on the act

   We’re in the midst of the digital portion of one of our current projects, putting swathes of material from our Salford and district collections online. With the help and support...

   27th September 2018 • Read more

6. 

   The Pringle Collection

   Our volunteer Paul Carpenter writes about the collection of the late Ian Pringle: The Library is always making new acquisitions. One of the latest and certainly the largest this year,...

   2nd August 2018 • Read more

7. 

   The Belle Vue Scenic Railway – our Special Correspondent writes

   Today’s blog post is a guest contribution from Jon Cocks, who not only worked on various of Belle Vue’s attractions, but (luckily for us) took his camera with him. We’re...

   30th July 2018 • Read more

8. 

   Dr Dee at Chetham’s – a view from illustrator Catherine Booth

   We often host classes of one kind of another at the Library, and it’s always intriguing for us as staff to see how people respond to aspects of the collections,...

   29th June 2018 • Read more

9. 

   Hulme Trust Archive: Manchester through the ages

   Thanks to a grant from the Hulme Trust in 2015, we’ve been working on cataloguing and conserving the substantial Hulme Trust Archive held at Chetham’s Library, to make it more...

   22nd June 2018 • Read more

10. 

    Sweated industries: “almost ceaseless toil, hard and unlovely to the last degree”

    ‘… earnings barely sufficient to sustain an existence; hours of labour such as to make the lives of the workers periods of almost ceaseless toil hard and unlovely to the...

    8th June 2018 • Read more