The Osborne Collection of Early Children's Books

In 1934, English librarian Edgar Osborne visited the Toronto Public Library's Boys & Girls House, the first free-standing children's library in the British Commonwealth. He was deeply impressed by the quality and range of children's services established by and flourishing under Lillian H. Smith. In 1949, as a tribute to Smith's work and reputation, Osborne presented his collection to the Toronto Public Library Board. The Osborne Collection encompasses the development of English Children's literature, a fourteenth-century manuscript of Aesop's fables, fifteenth-century traditional tales, sixteenth-century school texts and courtesy books, godly Puritan works, eighteenth-century chapbooks, moral tales and rational recreations, Victorian classics of fantasy, adventure and school stories, up to 1910 - the end of the Edwardian era.

Within the collection are: Florence Nightingale's childhood library; Queen Mary's children's books; materials pertaining to members of the Taylor family of Ongar; the Pettingell Collection of periodicals and penny dreadfuls; extensive holdings of the works of G.A. Henty; and the John Sullivan Hayes Collection, predominantly nineteenth and twentieth-century English Children's books and considerable Canadiana.

Toronto Public Library: On January 1, 1998, the former library systems of York, East York, Scarborough, North York, Etobicoke and Toronto, plus the Metro Reference Library, merged to become one, new Toronto Public Library. This library is the largest public library in Canada.