On Saturday 13^th July, Keighley Local Studies Library hosted members of the Keighley & District Local History Society in a full morning session examining the extensive photograph collection and the many other family and borough collections of records that include photographs and all kinds of images that reflect the development of the town and its community. The session started with an illustrated talk and presentation led by Angela Speight, assisted by Gina Birdsall.

Angela then answered some of the members’ questions about the Local Studies Library. Next was a chance to look around the many displays of records put out in the library. Staff even did some non-photographic research too.

Keighley’s collection was started over a hundred years ago with the deposit of around 150 images of the changing town of Keighley, produced as a survey by the Keighley & District Photography Association. This survey produced by Keighley photographers is now recognised by academic researchers into local history photography as one of the finest and unique for its forward- looking approach and its focus on the town’s development rather than nostalgic scenes, (please see earlier blog on this site by Professor Elizabeth Edwards).

Following that donation, members of the Association continued to donate photographs and were supported in this by library staff such as Reference Librarians Dr Ian Dewhirst MBE and Stewart Cardwell, himself a member of the Association. Both Ian and Stewart published books to showcase the collection and to promote interest in the medium of photography as a vibrant source of social history. Ian went on to write a weekly column in the Keighley News called “Down Memory Lane”, that was always illustrated with a photograph or an image of some kind. Over the years, many local people have continued to donate photographs and family collections, even including family albums.

The archive also holds a range of local business collections that show product illustrations and photographs of shop floors, staff at work, on works’ trips and celebrating national events such as Coronations. Our school archives have recently been boosted by the gift of the Schools’ Heritage Group collection and Janet Mawson is currently putting together a display based on the largest collection of images donated for a Keighley school, Highfield School. Janet is also working on a first for the library service, a heritage school reunion on 24^th August, to mark the receipt of the archive, also as part of the Keighley Library’s commemorative events for the library’s 120^th anniversary and as a fitting tribute to one of Keighley Library’s biggest fans, the recently late David Kirkley who was a founder member of the Schools’ Heritage Group.

The Library’s biggest and oldest collection that Angela Speight has been cataloguing is BK 36 that includes thousands of photographs and postcards including an incredible collection that staff believe was from a local photography business in the town as it has pages of numbered photographs with a corresponding numeric index. 

We also learned something new about one of our collections, a set of double shot photographs mounted on card were identified by the Local History Society as a set of early Stereoscopic cards that show many Keighley scenes from the 1890s. The cards would be placed in a stereoscope so creating a 3D image of the scene, bringing it to life for the viewer and was a popular form of entertainment in the Victorian era.   

Members of the Keighley & District Local History Society seemed to really enjoy the morning and staff even heard the words “excellent” and “brilliant”, and what more could you want from fellow local historians. A big thank you to all who attended and to Tim Neal for helping to organise the visit.   

Keighley Local Studies Team