National Chess Library

Since September last year I have been travelling weekly by bus to Battle to help with the arrangement of the National Chess Library books on the shelves. The Library is now in the Offices of the English Chess Federation at the Watch Oak. Here is a plan I made of the current arrangement of the subjects on the shelves.

The Library is made up of a number of separate collections, the largest of which are the ECF's own collection and that from Harry Golombek. The books are labelled to show which donor collection they are from, and are now mostly arranged on the shelves by subject rather than collection. Because of the way the Library has accumulated there are many duplicates. Duplicate periodicals are being stored in the loft and duplicate books are on the bottom shelves. The Library is open for visitors, but the offices are closed at week ends.