Horsham Library 1960s-1970s

I recall the former branch library in North Street, Horsham, designed and built sometime in the late 1950s in post-Modern style -early 1960s, which, I was told, replaced an earlier one on a nearby site also in North Street nearer to the Carfax.

I can remember particularly well the old grey-painted electric hot-air-fan heaters set into the walls, the very heavy metal andglass internal doors and the wired glazed internal partitions and the then-popular Esavian-brand curved plywood and metal frame chairs at the reading tables.

The ground storey, the adult section, occupied about two thirds of the plan area and was two storeys high, with a central 'atrium' to the roof. The first storey covered just the smaller children's library along the front and contained largely reference and study books and papers. To one side, behind the stairs, was the librarians'office. Outside was short rank of concrete 'trough' cycle stands.

Sometime in the late 1960s or early 1970s,the large reception desk was re-equipped with the then-latest in ticket issuing technology. Gone were the former multiple card tickets in wooden trays and ink date stamps, and in came little orange-coloured single plastic tickets with some holes punched in them. It was a new form of computerised recording that used a beam of light inside the desktop that shone through the holes. The librarian inserted the ticket and a little light changed colour to show the status of the book and loan.

We lived in Roffey then and one of our near-neighbours in Leechpool Lane was a Miss Clifford, who I believe was or became head librarian. She was a quiet and very pleasant single woman who was a professional librarian to her fingertips. Some memories of a more civilised and peaceful era in Hor sham..