Wylie Collection

Almost 1,000 volumes relating to the history and topography of Glasgow and its environs from the 18th century to the early 1900s, including valuable material on the Glasgow International Exhibitions of 1888 and 1901.

The collection contains a number of Glasgow periodicals of the 18th and 19th centuries and a series of Glasgow directories, the earliest dated 1783. There are also substantial collections of printed ephemera: broadsides, playbills, advertisements, valentines and chapbooks. Also included is a small quantity of manuscript material, including photographs and watercolours.

Bequeathed in 1921 by Robert Wylie (d.1921), chairman of the Glasgow firm of furnishers, Wylie & Lochhead, and a founder member of the Glasgow Bibliographical Society.

 

How to find material in the Wylie Collection

 

• Browse through a list of printed items in the Wylie Collection (Sp Coll Bh11, Bh12, Bh13 and Bh14); or, use the rare books search to locate  a specific item.
• Browse through a list of manuscript and unpublished items from the collection; or use, the manuscripts search to locate a specific item.
• For chapbooks held in Wylie (and other collections, including many from other libraries), use the Scottish Chapbooks database: it records chapbooks published in Scotland with full details of their contents.

See also the following 'book of the month' articles that feature items from the Wylie Collection:

• The Glasgow/Northern Looking Glass Glasgow: 1825-1826 (Book of the month: June 2005)
• Valentines & Dabbities Glasgow: 1850s (Book of the month: February 2002)