Provided by Sarah McCabe, who as a newly graduated librarian looking for a volunteer opportunity, was delighted to lead the project. Sarah is now Project Manager and Librarian of the OHS – and she’s also a director of the NYHS.

In January 2014, the Ontario Historical Society (OHS) began an exciting volunteer project to take stock of and organize the Society’s considerable and valuable printed resources on Ontario’s history.

In the historic John McKenzie House, headquarters of the OHS at 34 Parkview Avenue in Willowdale, the upper floor of the coach house, formerly a recreation room houses the majority of the collection. Now containing over 4,000 items, the OHS library catalogue is searchable online at https://www.librarything.com/catalog/OntarioHistoricalSoc/yourlibrary.

Particular strengths include Toronto history, First Nations history, Black history, built heritage and biographies of prominent Ontarians. The library also contains a complete collection of issues of OHS’ scholarly journal Ontario History from 1899 to the present.

The OHS thanks the North York Historical Society for its donation of The Mirror Presents the People and Events of North York …Past, Present and Future on Their 50th Birthday (1972). Other recent donations include North York’s Modernist Architecture (2009), a Revisited edition (2010) and the City of North York’s Directory to The Inventory of Heritage Properties, 1996 (reprint) from the North York Community Preservation Panel.

To make an appointment to visit the library, please email ohs@ontariohistoricalsociety.ca or call 416-226-9011. More information about the library may be found on the OHS website at www.ontariohistoricalsociety.ca/index.php/services/library.

Originally published in the September-November 2015 North York Historical Society Newsletter

 

Photo: Sarah McCabe