Lexington’s African American Heritage Walking Tour
Join us for an on-demand walking tour of Downtown Lexington’s African American heritage sites.
Join us for an on-demand walking tour of Downtown Lexington’s African American heritage sites.
Explore topics related to Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math (STEAM) in this space for youth, grades 3-12.
Learn how the Lexington Public Library Foundation empowers change within our library system.
Learn or develop a personal or professional skill with LinkedIn Learning classes, available for free with your library card.
Did you know physical materials renew automatically if they don’t have a waiting list? Check your account online to see the status of your items.
The Lexington Public Library’s Digital Archives provide open access to researchers and students to learn more about the rich history of Lexington and Fayette County. It contains a fraction of the Library’s physical holdings, which are housed and available for reference in the Kentucky Room at the Central Library. New material is being digitized and added constantly, so there's always something new to find.
The archives have a simple keyword search, and it is possible to browse the collections by subject, area, or decade. The Lexington Public Library actively reviews and labels materials in our archives with statements that indicate how you may reuse the images, and what sort of permission, if any, you need to do so. Please check the information for each image to determine its legal status.
Fayette County, Kentucky, has changed enormously since it was created in 1792. This collection contains government documents for the city of Lexington, for Fayette County, and for the merged Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government, as well as funeral notices, club directories, scrapbooks, image collections and a history of Lexington Public Library.
The Lexington Public Library has made an effort to ensure that all of our digital collections are public domain, or that we have gotten approval from the copyright holders to display their work. Most - but not all - of these collections, to the best of our knowledge, have no known US copyright restrictions. Some items in the collection are under copyright but qualify for online display by libraries under Section 108(h) of United States Copyright Law. Some of the collections provided in the Library's Digital Archives are made available under an assertion of fair use, which does not necessarily apply to an individual's use of them.
Discover unique resources in our Digital Archives that tell the story of Fayette County. Visit cemeteries throughout Central Kentucky using our cemetery maps. Contact our resident experts in the Central Library's Kentucky Room with questions.
The library has a variety of directories and yearbooks with local information. In the library's current digital collection, there is a selection of residential and street directories, yearbooks, school directories, and organizational directories. These are all fully word-searchable.
The Kentucky Room's collections contain Lexington's residential directories going back over 200 years, and are some of the most useful resources for researchers looking for family information, neighborhood histories, and house histories.
The Digital Studio provides people of all skill levels the tools for filmmaking, photography and digital art, music making, and media preservation.
Fayette County churches contain some of the earliest records and information preserved about central Kentucky history. The digital archive contents include church ledgers, minutes, directories, and informational brochures.
Lexington's school system dates back to the city charter of 1831, and it first school opened in 1834. From a single building in 1834 with about 100 students, today the Fayette County Public School system has over 40,000 students and 68 schools and programs. Lexington and Fayette County combined districts in 1968, shortly before the city/county government merger in 1974.
Fayette County's buildings contain a great deal of history about the region and its inhabitants.
The Old Kentucky Architecture book by Rexford Newcomb (1940) contains images, details, and some architectural layouts from all around Kentucky, but the Lexington properties include Llangollen (the Dr. John C. Lewis House), the Benjamin Gratz House, Rose Hill, Hopemont, Eothan, Ashland, Mansfield, Helm Place, Carrick House at Whitehall, Morrison College at Transylvania University, the tomb of Gideon Shryock's father Matthew at the Old Episcopal Burying Grounds, Ingleside (listed here as Ingelside), Loudoun House, Botherum, Walnut Hill Church, and the Sexton's Cottage at the Old Episcopal Burying Grounds.
The Court-Houses of Lexington by J. Winston Coleman, Jr. (1937) contains photos and history of Fayette County's four courthouses.
The Illustrated Lexington (1919) has a variety of images, but included are some exterior and interior photographs of downtown Lexington businesses and houses.
Bluegrass Houses and Their Traditions by Elizabeth M. Simpson (1932) contains photos of various Fayette and surrouding county properties, with descriptions of the families, buildings, and contents. The properties include Glendower, Castleton, Eothan, Idle Hour, Maxwell Place, Winton, Elmendorf, Clingendaal, Morrison College, La Chaumiere du Prairie, Scarlet Gate, the Meadows, Lindenhouse, Belair, Mount Brilliant, Coldstream, Hopemont, Bodley House, Roberts House, Woodburn House, Botherum, Greentree, Ingleside, Loudoun, Thorn Hill, Rose Hill (Buckner), Elmwood, Sycamore Park, Walnut Hall, Edwards House, Patchen Wilkes, Hurricane Hall, Forkland, the Old Keen Place, Xalapa, the Ward Place, Calumet, Dunreath, Kilmore, Alleghan Hall, Sumner’s Forest, Stoneley, Rose Hill (Talbert), Helm Place, Castlelawn, Dixiana, Bryan Station, Poplar Hill, Mansfield, Fowler’s Garden, Mount Hope, Hollyrood, and Ashland.
Gratz Park (1983) contains illustrations and brief descriptions of the buildings and features of Gratz Park in downtown Lexington.
The Fayette County Postcard collection contains images of well-known sites in Central Kentucky, such as Keeneland, Transylvania University, Ashland, and many others. The 80 images provide an interesting perspective of Lexington architecture, industry, and culture in the early 20th Century.
The Kentucky History collection contains Kentucky-related documents not specifically related to Fayette County.
The materials in these collections are physically housed in the Kentucky Room at the Central Library and can be viewed during the Central Library's open hours.
For more information about a specific item, including any copyright restrictions on that item, please click on the information button:
Use this form to add a digital version of your library card to your digital wallet.
Lexington, Kentucky (February 1, 2024) – This February, Lexington Public Library is proud to join the nation in celebrating Black History Month, a time dedicated to honoring the achievements, contributions, and rich cultural heritage of African Americans.
An eligible parent or legal guardian can complete this form to apply for a digital library card for a juvenile.
Eligible applicants can complete this form to apply for a digital library card.
Thanks for your interest in joining the Lexington Public Library! Your library card is the key to checking out books, downloading audiobooks, taking online classes, and much more. Please check here to find out if you qualify for a library card and how to apply.
While the focus of content in the digital archive is Fayette County, many other counties are represented. This list is in alphabetical order by county name for non-Fayette County content.
Anderson County
Bath County
Boone County
Bourbon County
Boyd County
Boyle County
Breathitt County
Bullitt County
Caldwell County
Calloway County
Christian County
Clark County
Clay County
Floyd County
Franklin County
Garrard County
Graves County
Grayson County
Hardin County
Harlan County
Hopkins County
Jackson County
Jefferson County
Jessamine County
Johnson County
Knox County
Laurel County
Leslie County
Livingston County
Madison County
Mason County
Meade County
Mercer County
Muhlenberg County
Nelson County
Owsley County
Pulaski County
Robertson County
Rockcastle County
Scott County
Shelby County
Warren County
Washington County
Wolfe County
Woodford County
The Lexington History Museum began in 1999, and opened its doors in the Old Courthouse in 2003. Its purpose is to educate Fayette County about its rich history, and preserve pieces of that history for future generations. The Old Courthouse closed in 2012 for extensive renovations. The History Museum still creates exhibits and works on school and film collaborations to create an understanding and appreciation of local history.
The History Museum's Community Collections currently contains part of the exhibit "Our Fair City: The 1999 Lexington Fairness Ordinance," which was displayed in the summer of 2019 at the Lexington Public Library, to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the ordinance's passage.
The Lexington-Fayette County Health Department had its earliest form almost as long as the city itself has existed, when the newly formed city of Lexington would appoint a local physician to investigate reports of certain diseases for quarantine. As early as 1794, Lexington's citizens were getting smallpox inoculations. The city created a Board of Health possibly as early as the 1820s, as a young Lexington experienced cholera outbreaks, typhus, smallpox, and the various growing pains created by more people living and working closer together. In 1938, the Lexington city Board of Health merged with the county’s Board to become the Fayette County Health Department.
The board minutes for January 1904 – April 1922 provided by the Health Department show the broad range of topics impacting local citizens, and the Health Department’s role in keeping its citizens healthier. Through the decades, the Health Department has tested the local milk supply for tuberculosis, led education and vaccination programs, inspected restaurants, set quarantines to prevent the spread of disease, improved sanitation, and at one point ran the local crematory and eruptive hospital.