Leadhills Miners' Library

The village of Leadhills originated as a community of lead miners working in the ore fields of the Lowther Hills on the border of Lanarkshire and Dufries and Galloway. The miners developed  a strong sense of the need for both self improvement and mutual  collective improvement.  In response to this in 1741 a group of miners and the local schoolmaster founded a lending library  to serve those in the village  who wished to have access  to books which they otherwise never could have.

The library was run on a subscription basis with borrowers required  to pay an initial  joining fee and an annual subscription  but, more radically than that, requiring that before  joining they were subject to approval  by the membership.

The library  still carries its collection  of important books but it no longer allows them to be borrowed.  The library is in the original single storey  cottage where it was founded and is currently  run by a group of volunteers. The library holds around 2500 books,  a collection  of other artifacts and a large collection  of “bargain books ” the records of contracts between miners and mine owners which show the prices paid for a pound of lead ore or per fathom for advancement in non- productive rock in the search for new veins. This is the largest such collection  in Scotland.