Gibson Library Society I would like to start this meeting with an apology for having to hold over the AGM from last May until now. The committee was reluctant to take this step, but we were following government advice, and also checked with the Charity Commission before taking the decision to defer. We had hoped at the time to be able to hold normal meetings again, but have reluctantly resorted to Zoom as the alternative way of keeping in touch with our members.
During the year from April 2019 to March 2019 we were able to hold a full programme of events, with talks on the following topics: "Pageant Fever", Peterloo, the suffragette Gertrude Colmore, Henry Winstanley, the Social Stitch - with only our talk about Thomas Plume having to be cancelled because of pandemic restrictions. In addition to the normal talks, we also held a relaunch to mark the changing of the name of the Library from the Town Library to The Gibson Library. Members and guests attended a packed reception to hear Gillian Darley perform the official side of the event, and this was followed by an evening talk based on her recent book 'Excellent Essex'.
Other events during the year included our New Year social in January, 'An Evening from the Spare Room' organised by Gillian Williamson using material discovered in the library and from her forthcoming book on lodgers.
In July a party of members visited the Whipple Library on what proved to be the hottest day ever recorded in Cambridge. Other events during the year, included, in May 2019, a reception to mark the presentation by former committee member Lizzie Sanders of eleven large bound volumes of archival material relating to the history of Littlebury, and then in December, a book launch for Lizzie's book on the Landscape of Audley End. In February Gillian Williamson organised a successful one-day pop-up exhibition in the reading room under the heading "Who Do You Think They Were?" based around two 19th-century portraits found in the Town Hall.
Our talks and events form only a small part of the work carried out in the Library and by the Committee and the volunteers. In April 2019 we recruited several new volunteers, which enabled us to provide a person on the reception desk in the reading room on several occasions each week, and to tackle a number of other small tasks. Unfortunately, however two of our long term volunteers, Jan Bright and Doreen Harvey who together indexed thousands of our photographs on a database over a period of many years decided to retire, and we have still not been able to find anyone to replace them. We have, however, gained a volunteer photographer, Dominic Davey, who has taken over from Gordon Ridgewell as Photographic Recorder.
During the year we have had a number of visitors to the Library, over and above our usual range of enquiries, these include: a visit from future speaker Julie Miller, ERO intern and blogger researching Quaker history; Helen Frost from the Plume Library at Maldon; Sarah Pennell, academic and author of several books on "food cultures, health, material culture, domestic interiors, spaces and architecture and the history of domestic cooking" who is currently researching 17th-century writer Hannah Woolley; Peter Moore, archivist at Audley End; Anglia Parents' Group; and Clavering History Group. We also had a visit from 3 members from Save Our Libraries (Essex), and held a volunteers' 'Tea Party'.
During the early part of the year, up until the relaunch mentioned earlier, Kelly Cole, Gillian and Peter Walker did an enormous amount of work liaising with designers Identity Creative on the preparation of our new leaflet, and preparing and installing new high quality signage throughout the library.
Near the end of the year, on March 20, at about 5 pm, Essex County Libraries announced the immediate closure of all Essex Libraries for a period of three months. Staff and volunteers were not permitted to into the buildings.
In addition to the forced cancellation of our lecture programme, the following were also cancelled as a result of the closure: a research visit by Barbara Burman; a visit by County High School Geography students; a visit by local author Martin Rose, with print specialists from the British Library and from the Fitzwilliam Museum to look at our set of Henry Winstanley prints, and the transfer of the volumes from the Friends' Meeting House Library.
However, prior to lockdown, a lot of very practical things were achieved, including damp-proofing work in the cellar, which involved the removal or moving and replacement of most of the volumes ably undertaken by Charles Reese, Peter and volunteer Richard Woods. We also successfully installed 50 new shelves in the Gibson Room under the supervision of John Ready, and have started moving special items and small archival collections onto the new shelves. It is now easier to find previously scattered material, and creates useful space elsewhere in the library. Peter has also transferred members' email addresses onto Mailchimp - effectively streamlining our mailshots to members.
In February a combined group of volunteers, staff and committee members visited the Cambridge Conservation Consortium workshop to look at conservation processes, equipment and techniques.
The year has not been without its sadness, however, as I have to report the deaths of several of our members, including Patricia and Robin Picard, the founders of the Church Street Gallery, and Mary Knight, one of the last surviving members of the Literary Institute and a founding member of the Library Society (formed in 1982).
The recent death of Lizzie Sanders, former committee member and for several years secretary of the Society is most keenly felt. Lizzie helped to design and produce a leaflet we used for many years, and also made the short but beautiful films that we often show at the start of our meetings. These short films, based on books in the Library, were shown at Saffron Screen over two months with great success. We will miss Lizzie.
Lastly, I would like to conclude my report with a special thanks to all members of the committee, who have continued work behind the scenes during lockdown. Special mention must go to retiring member John Ready, for overseeing a number of building related projects, which could not have been undertaken without his expertise, and also for providing the solution to replacing our weather-worn external sign; to Howard Newman for re-gilding and re-hanging the external sign, and for restoring the dial on the reading room clock; to Gillian Williamson, Secretary, for keeping us all organised; to Kelly Cole for her sheer hard slog in putting together several fund-raising applications; and to Peter Walker who not only has all our financial information at his fingertips, but has willingly shouldered a number of important internet related tasks to bring us into the 21st century, and of course, to our President, Bruce Munro for his wise advice.
Martyn Everett
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Chairman, Gibson Library Society, September 2020
Return to the AGM 2020 page.
