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Book in for a free lecture

A free public lecture to explore the history of library books and buildings in Middlesbrough will take place at the University of º£½ÇÖ±²¥ on Wednesday 7 November at 6.30pm.

Entitled, ‘Reading Middlesbrough: a history of library books and buildings,’ the illustrated lecture will be presented by Linda Polley, Programme Leader of the Master of Arts History degree at the University. The lecture will take place in Room H0.01 of the Centuria building, starting at 6.30pm. Refreshments will be available from 6pm. To book a place, contact the University’s Library and Information Services on 01642 342114 or email f.winchurch@tees.ac.uk.

The lecture forms part of a series of events to mark the tenth anniversary of the opening of the University’s Learning Resource Centre on Southfield Road.

Linda will look at the relationship between buildings in Middlesbrough, their plans and the attitudes to public reading and library education in the 19th and 20th centuries.

She will give an account of the way libraries have evolved as civic, architectural and educational entities. The Mechanics Institute, Literary and Philosophical Society and the University will all be covered in the talk, which will be richly illustrated with images from local history and archive collections.

Linda said: ‘Middlesbrough's history may seem a well trodden path. Local historians have been examining the town's origins and rapid development right from its very beginnings. But what of the people who lived and worked here? How were their often novel experiences shaped and understood? My research suggests that access to newspapers and library books was one means whereby nineteenth century urban citizens could begin to understand their rapidly changing environment. And those in a position to provide that access were doing something similar in their discharging of a civic duty.’

Professor Gerda Roper, Dean of the School of Arts & Media, said: ‘Mass literacy is a nineteenth century ‘invention’, so how better to examine the development of an archetypal Victorian town than through the books, newspapers and knowledge its citizens could acquire in the Mechanics’ Institute, the Literary and Philosophical Society, various reading rooms, the ‘free’ library and eventually its own polytechnic and university libraries.

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