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McDonald Road Library

Edinburgh, Italy

McDonald Road Library

McDonald Road Library is one of 28 freely-accessible public libraries in Edinburgh, Scotland. The library opened in 1904 as the East Branch of the city's library service. It is located on the corner of McDonald Road and Leith Walk, and is a category B listed building. At its opening the library held

a stock of 11,498 volumes and recorded in excess of 190,000 issues (loans) per annum during its early years. Books were not directly accessible by the public for browsing until after 1922 when Edinburgh's library service switched to an "open access" approach to their collections. In the year the library opened the then-five public libraries serving the city issued 962,724 loans from stock. The building is one of the original five branch libraries, constructed and opened after Central Library, under the stewardship of Hew Morrison who served as Principal Librarian between 1887 and 1922. The fourth branch library constructed, McDonald Road was built with help from funding provided by the trustees of a bequest from publisher Thomas Nelson to provide "shelter halls" for the working men of the city. By 1950, the stock of volumes held in the library had more than tripled: 33,963 in the main...

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