Kings College Maughan Library

          The Maughan library is located just outside of the City of London at Kings College.  The library opened its doors in 1851 as a public records office, so they also store government records. When the library was built they kept fire safety and cost in mind since it was built before electricity. The facility only has a couple of fireplaces in the entire building, so it was really cold in the wintertime (they don't use them anymore). They also wanted as much natural light as possible so they put in as many windows as possible. The building has a cellular structure, with over 300 total rooms! Some more modern renovations have opened up some of these rooms. Where the inquiry room is at the front of the building, it was originally a reading room. Now they have  around reading room similar to the one at the British Library but smaller. We were able to get a quick look into the reading room, but students were studying so we had to be quiet. 

          The tour of the Maughan Library was split up into two parts. The first group was given a lecture on the library and about some items they had on display. While the second group got to tour the library and the reading room in the library. I really enjoyed my visit to the library because they showed us some really interesting items. More so, because this was the only place that actually let us touch some of the items. This was really exciting for me because it actually allowed me to really experience the items and get a feel for them. One item in particular that I got really excited over actually came from Thomas Jefferson's own personal library. It was the called The Charters of the Provence of Pennsylvania, and they know it was his because the inside cover bears his signature!

Overall, I had a wonderful experience at the Kings College Maughan Library. 

Source:

https://www.kcl.ac.uk/library/visiting/maughan

National Art Library at the V&A Museum

         The National Art Library is located at the V&A museum in London. They are one of the top four leading libraries in the world with over 30,000 visitors a year. The library is open to the public five days a week, and most of their visitors are academics and students. They have a massive collection containing over 1 million items. Their collections consist of children's book, artists books, exhibition catalogs, calligraphy, correspondence letters and more. All of their collections are available to view on their online catalog, making it easy to access. The retrieval time for items is around 30 minutes, or if the items are in special collections you can request something ahead of time. 

          The tour for the British Studies program was split up into two parts. The first group received lecture on the library which included a display on some of their impressive items in their collection. While the second group received a tour of the library and their storage rooms. I went with the first group to look at some of their items in their care. One of the most prestigious items was one of Shakespeare's first folios! This is the first published work of a collection of Shakespeare's plays, it was published in 1623 six years after his death. A copy of his first folio sold for 3.5 million and the library has three of them! Unfortunately, their collection is not insured because many of their items are irreplaceable. So to protect the folio they have it locked up in a safe. 

          The second part of the tour we were able to get a behind the scenes look at how the library runs, and where they store all their items. The main reading room of the library is really pretty, there are two stories but the main floor is where visitors go. The second floor balcony is holds some book storage, and overall the library was really open and had a lot of natural light. The tour of the storage rooms were interesting because I learned that they store their items by size and not subject. This concept is unfamiliar, but I suppose if you have everything in an online catalog it doesn't matter where you store it. Plus this way they get to save space by maximizing every shelf. 

Source:
https://www.vam.ac.uk/info/national-art-library/

British Museum Archives

          I think one of the mist interesting places we visited for the British Studies Program was the British Museum Archives. One reason why I think this is because the museums central archives is located in their gorgeous reading room. Usually when we visit an archives I am used to the storage location being in a basement, or warehouse type room. Instead, since there was a huge mold problem in their original storage space in the basement, they had to improvise and move everything to the reading room. This is not ideal, since it is difficult to maintain a stable environment. Regardless the reading room is impressive and at first sight it is truly breathtaking with its large dome, and simple yet beautiful design. 

This is the main lobby area of the museum, the door to the reading room is at the center. 

What the reading room looks like now. 

Old photograph of the reading room. 

           The British Museum library and archives hold over 300,000 items that date back to the founding of the museum in 1753. The central archive hold administrative documents like information on the trustees, financial documents, policy records and more. While each curatorial department keep and maintain their own records. Some of the really captivating items that we were shown include some log books with Carl Marx's signature! The records show that Marx was a regular visitor of the library for around 30 years. The signature in the image below is the fourth from the top. 

Old log book with Carl Marx's signature. 

Administrative records. 

          Overall, my visit to the British Museum Archives was interesting. They have a unique situation with their archives located in the reading room. After our tour we were able to see everything else that the museum has to offer. For instance, they have a really impressive Egyptian collection that is a must see!

Source:

https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/libraries_and_archives.aspx

Middle Temple Library

         Middle Temple Law Library is located within the City of London. Its primary purpose is to provide reference for all four Inns of Courts, and next year they will provide for students as well. They have over 250,000 items in their collection all of which are accessible through their online databases and catalogs. The library at Middle Temple was founded in 1641 when Robert Ashely donated 3,700 books. This founding collection now makes up the core collection of rare books in the library. 

         Our visit to the library began in one of their meeting rooms, where the librarian gave us some background history on the library and its services. One interesting thing I learned about was Barristers, something I was not really familiar with previously. They are similar to lawyers except they are considered specialist within a certain area of their field. Barristers can become judges but first they must pass 12 qualifying sessions to do so. Another thing I learned that was interesting is that the library keeps all old editions of law books, just in case they need to reference back to them if for instance an outdated law is still active. 

         After the initial introduction of the law library, we were given a tour. The tour consisted of the main library, the bench apartments and the formal dining hall. The library was two stories tall, with shelves lined up on each side. The library also had on display a pair of 17th century celestial globes which I though were really fascinating. I guess they are one of the oldest of their kind. Next we walked through the bench apartments. The one we went to was called the Queens Room, where barristers of court meet. We learned there that Prince William became an Honorary Barrister in 2010, and the apartment we were in was one he would most likely use.

Middle Temple Law Library

Book Shelf in the library.

         Lastly, we toured the Royal Hall. The hall was originally used as a lecture hall, and for theatre performances. Nowadays, it is still used for meetings, and it is also used as a dining hall. 

An interesting fact, is that the halls roof is the larges double hammer roof in the U.K. Overall, I really enjoyed my visit to the Middle Temple Law Library. 

The Royal Hall

Source:

https://www.middletemple.org.uk/library-and-archive

National Maritime Museum Library

         The National Maritime Museum contains over 2 million items, its collections are relevant to Britain's  history of exploration, navigation, and conquest of the sea. The museum was founded in 1934, and is located within the Greenwich Royal Park in London. Our group visited the museum to tour the library and archives as one of our last class trips for the British Studies Program. 

         The museum's library and archives were located in the museum on the second floor. Everything was new and upgraded since they recently went through a move to their new space. The library was split of into two sections, that was divided by a glass wall. On one side was the staff desks and area for group discussion and meetings, while the other side (where we sat at) was for independent research and sometimes used for meetings. In the library the shelving was kept at a minimum, short shelves lined under the windowsills, and there was an additional row next to it. Most of their items were stored either in the basement or off site, and they would retrieve them as needed.   

          For this visit we did not receive a tour of the facility, instead the librarian and archivists had a presentation set up which included a slide show and items laid out on the table. I really enjoyed viewing the items on display and learning about their history. For instance, an item that I really enjoyed looking at was the Cosmographia from 1482. This item is a book that describes the world, its basically an atlas and it contains beautifully drawn illustrations of maps. The one that I looked at was written by Claudius Ptolemy a famous mathematician, astronomer, and geographer. He lived under the Roman Empire in Alexandria. The atlas is a medieval edition of his work, and contains beautiful illustrations!

This picture shows the display they had set u p for us, in the background you can see the Cosmographia. 

        Overall my visit to the National Maritime Museum was very pleasant. I would recommend it for anyone who is interested in researching history related to the British maritime. 

Source:
https://www.rmg.co.uk/national-maritime-museum

Christ Church Library

           During the first week in the British Studies program we made a visit to Oxford England to visit some of the university libraries. One of them was the Christ Church Library. Christ Church is one of 38 constituent colleges a part of the University of Oxford. They are one of the most finically backed, and have a large number of attending students at around 600-700. What I found really impressive was just being able to walk around campus. The buildings date back to the 16th century and are beautiful. In fact, some of the scenes from the Harry Potters where filmed here. 

           The first place we visited on the tour was the 'old' library, where they house all their special collection of books dating back to medieval times. This part of the tour I found really interesting because we got to see some impressive items from their collection. For instance, the librarian showed us a pocket book of Psalms that was dated to be from around 1200 A.D. While another item was actually Queen Victoria's own personal Bible! The Bible was so fragile that he could not take is out of the box, instead he just gently opened the book. 

Pictured here is the librarian holding the book of Psalms. 

Here the librarian is showing us Queen Victoria's Bible. 

          On the second part of the tour we visited the 'new' library, which contained their modern lending library and early printed books. The library is located on the first and second floor of the building, which we quietly walked through since students were studying. Then we ended up in the librarians office, which we later found out that it used to be the Lewis Carrols office! Overall, I really enjoyed my visit to the Christ Church Library!

Source:
https://www.chch.ox.ac.uk/library

National Museum of Computing

The last place we went to tour during the British Studies program was the National Museum of Computing. I had no real previous information about this museum, but other student filled me in that this is the location where they broke codes during World War II and the blockbuster film The Imitation Game is loosely based on the code breaking that occurred here. 

This image shows the actual location that the code breaking occurred. 

            The museum is separate from the actual location that the code breaking occurred during WWII, the picture above shows the actual location. The museum is in a separate building in Bletchley Park in Milton Keynes Buckinghamshire. They officially opened their doors in 2007, and they house a large collection of vintage computers. They also have a collection of replica computers that they rebuilt for the museum. 

The Lorenz teleprinter 

            The first machine that was introduced during our tour was the Lorenz teleprinter. The teleprinter shown above was used by the Germans to encrypt messages that were sent over the radio. The first thing that was done on the machine was set it to a specific key, then the key was sent over to the recipient of the message who also had the same machine. Both machine were then set to the same key, to send and or decrypt the message. Without the key it was virtually impossible to decrypt the message, since it just looked like a long string of random numbers and letters. The mistake the German made, were that sometime they would resend the same key over the radio. This allowed the code breakers to identify a pattern, and later break the code. What interesting is that this same machine was used up until the 80's!

A rebuilt Colossus Computer. 

          Another interesting thing I learned during the tour is that many of the computers were not originals, instead they were rebuilt versions. The Colossus computer was one of them. The original was built by a British codebreaker sometime from 1943-45 and it played a key role in decrypting codes from the Lorenz machine. It worked by looking for patterns in intercepted radio calls from the Germans. What was interesting to learn is that there was no real internal storage system, instead it had an output of information on two reels of paper that were then read.  

           Besides codebreaking machines and computers the National Museum of Computing also housed a large number of vintage computers. The image above shows one of the first available computers for home use from the 1950's. What I found interesting is that it is incredibly large! It hardly resembles a computer at all, instead it just looks like a large (and heavy) storage cabinet. Its also incredible to think about how far computers have gotten in such a short amount of time. I wonder where they will be 50 more years from now?

Source:

https://www.tnmoc.org/