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Are you strange and unusual?
Do you like strange and unusual reads?
Join us at West Sixth Brewing for our monthly Cult Classics Book Club! This month, we will be discussing the first half of "House of Leaves" by Mark Z. Danielewski. Copies of the book are available at the previous month meeting, or the Central Library's front desk.
Check for current job openings and apply to work at the Lexington Public Library.
Kentucky Histories Collection
All Digital Archives Collections
The Lexington Public Library is pleased to offer teachers, childcare providers, and homeschooling families the "Bucket of Books" service. We can supplement your curriculum with specially-selected books on a particular topic or provide your classroom with specially-selected books for your students' pleasure reading.
In 1944 Francoist Spain, Ofelia, fascinated with fairy-tales, is sent along with her pregnant mother to live with her new stepfather, a ruthless captain of the Spanish army.
Black Community News Collection
All Digital Archives Collections
Duncan-Goff Scrapbook Collection
Various objects found in our Duncan-Goff scrapbook collection.
All Digital Archives Collections
Aunt Tiny Belle Collection
The collection consists of an image, homemade brochures, flyers, pamphlets, and programs covering LGBTQ+ events and places from 1983 to 1999 in both Lexington and Louisville. Subjects include Leigh Angelique and other drag queens, Sweet Evening Breeze, Henry Faulkner, Greg Butler, the Royal Sovereign Imperial Court of All Kentucky and its Coronations, the Bungalow, the LMNOP, Jezebel’s, The Bar Complex, Crossings, Disco Circus, the Bluegrass C.O.L.T.S., AIDS Volunteers of Lexington, Johnny Angel’s, The Loft, and Trixie’s Hide and Seek.
The collection is named in honor of Tina Belle Green Winters Simpler Young, known as Tiny, a sex worker who in the 1920s and 30s sent $5.00 a week home to support her sister. For a time, she worked in the Crawl section of Frankfort, then moved to Lexington, and finally lived the rest of her life in Cincinnati.
The queerness of sex work, a marginalized woman using sex to support family, provides context both to this collection bearing her name and to the LGBTQ+ community that has historically formed families on the social margins.
All Digital Archives Collections
Muhlenberg County Black Marriages Book c.1866
Scans of the Black Marriage records from the Courthouse in Greenville, Kentucky.
All Digital Archives Collections
Miscellaneous Newspapers
The Micellaneous Newspaper collection combines scattered issues of various historic newspapers in our archive collection.
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Father William T. Punch Letter Collection
Letters from and/or about Father William T. Punch and the Punch family. Donated by a Lexington resident to Lexington Public Library. Father Punch was instrumental in building the 3rd St. Peter Catholic Church on Barr Street in Lexington, KY.
All Digital Archives Collections
Architecture Collection
Fayette County's buildings contain a great deal of history about the region and its inhabitants. The earliest structure in Lexington was built in 1779, the Blockhouse. Lexington currently has over 200 years of history reflected in its buildings all around the county. The contents of this collection show some of the published works about local architecture.
All Digital Archives Collections
Judge Kenneth Lyons Collection
The Judge Kenneth Lyons collection consists of an atlas, a journal, and letters. The atlas features copies of letters written on the blank pages of the atlas. The journal contains family and local history recorded by a Robert K. Bryan. The earliest date of the letters is 1863. Items are from Bourbon and Nicholas Counties, Kentucky.
All Digital Archives Collections
The Reporter (1808-1817)
The Reporter was published from March 1808-September 1817, by William W. Worsley. It was a Republican paper (Jeffersonian Democratic Republican - liberal at the time). The paper was published throughout the War of 1812, and was occasionally semi-weekly when Congress was in session. The name of the paper changed to Kentucky Reporter in October 1817.
All Digital Archives Collections
Directory Collection
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.
All Digital Archives Collections
Voyages, Adventures and Situation of the French Emigrants, translated by A Lady
This work contains information about French Emigrants to America over the years 1789-1799, and provides a history of the French Revolution. The work was originally in French, and was translated into English by an anonymous translator using the pen name, "A Lady." Published in 1800 in Lexington, KY, this work uses the "Long S" depicted as an "f".
All Digital Archives Collections
Historic St. Paul Catholic Church
The St. Paul Catholic Church Collection includes materials from the Church's archive. The Roman Catholic church is over 150 years old, and is located on West Short Street, in downtown Lexington.
All Digital Archives Collections
The Independent Gazetteer (1803-1804)
The Independent Gazetteer was founded and printed by James Charless in 1803, with ads appearing in the Kentucky Gazette about its upcoming publication. The first issue was printed March 29, 1803. The paper was later sold to Robert Kay and then to T. Anderson. This collection contains issues from 1803 and 1804, though the paper may have been published through 1809.