As everywhere today, people came together to mark the day that World War One ended on the 11^th day of the 11^th month at 11am in 1918. It’s a day marked by towns and villages all over the country as a day for communities, families and individuals to remember the great loss of life that war brings, not least the lives of service and military personnel.

Keighley Local Studies Library hosted a family history morning session for local people to trace the members of their families who have served in the war and on the Home Front through the archives available and we were fortunate enough to get the help of the Queen’s Award winning volunteers the Men of Worth, led by Andy Wade and Ian Walkden, who as always gave of their helpful best. Library staff also displayed the many library books on local and family history specific to the session and copies of original records from the unique library archive collection held in Keighley.

It was a successful morning and we hope that everyone gained a better knowledge of their own families’ history and of the local history of the Keighley area as affected by war. Keighley’s Town Mayor, Councillor Luke Maunsell and Consort, Debbie Maunsell, also visited and this added to the occasion. Events like this particularly emphasise the value of local archives to the community as a whole and of the essential contribution they make to the wider bank of knowledge that is our national history as it unfolds. We are all inevitably touched by national and international affairs and 2022 has proved no small exception.

Andy Wade also took the opportunity to present to Keighley Library a copy of the Oakworth Roll of Honour 1914-1919 and 2014-2019.

Many thanks to everyone who attended.

Keighley Local  Studies Library has a unique and quite extensive archive of World War 1 and WW2 records. These include national and local memorabilia and archives. The Keighley War hospital records are particularly interesting and of national importance as they are a rarity. They include the Dr Scatterty collection which has a Patients’ register, archive BK39, that contains 13,214 names of servicemen who were treated at the local Morton War Hospital. The register also records the names of German prisoners of war who were being held locally and who required treatment from time to time, notably from the influenza epidemic.

The Queen’s Award winning Men of Worth Project are documenting the men and women of Keighley and the Worth Valley who served the country in wartime and volunteers have done a lot of research into Keighley Library’s unique collection. Volunteers have also been working hard to transcribe and digitise the Patient Register.

On the 11 November, we hope to combine the two archives and, with the award winning assistance of Men of Worth volunteers, we hope to be able to help local people trace the service men and women in their families from Keighley and the Worth valley area. It is a short session this year and will be broken by the two minutes’ silence in Keighley’s Town Hall square. Please join us if you can.

On Saturday 8^th October, Keighley Library will be bursting with activity, not least Keighley Local Studies with a major investigation into local crime fiction, past and present.

At 11 am, please join us as local literary super sleuths and authors, Ann Dinsdale (Principal Curator of Haworth Parsonage) and Sharon Wright (journalist, speaker and author) thrash out the mysterious twists, turns and crimes in the life of the Revd. Austin Lee who was one of Keighley Library’s most borrowed crime authors in the 1950s with a curious fascination for Haworth and the Brontës.

In the afternoon at 2pm, dust down for finger prints with the popular crime author Frances Brody, whose Kate Shackleton mysteries reach their 13^th challenge, this time set in the grounds of the mysterious Milner Field and Saltaire Village. Find out what inspires crime story writing that is set in  Yorkshire locations and investigate the creative impulse, as well as the challenges of local history research for fiction.

Both events are free but seats are limited so please telephone us on 01535 618215 to book a seat.

Keighley Library will also be hosting events for the Keighley Arts and Film Festival with a Create, Connect and Make Festival and the popular local history speaker, Irene Lofthouse, will be taking a walk around Keighley: Past and Present. Details for this to be released in the press and on social media.