The Handley Library is offering library goers an experience they just can’t read about.
The library, built between 1907 and 1910, was opened to the public on August 22, 1913 and some of the features that the first library goers saw and experienced are the same features you can experience today, over 100 years later.
“To think that the people of Winchester have been able to enjoy this for generations now is just marvelous,” Pat Richie, executive administrator of the Handley Library, says.
Pat Richie, amateur historian, enjoys taking tour goers beyond the books to dig into the history of the library.
“We have a lot of light fixtures that are original with even Thomas Edison patent number on the back of them We have original chandeliers, we have two original clocks and several tables and a lot of chairs that were original. We even have an original bulletin board that i know it cost 2 dollars when it was purchased back in 1913,” Richie says.
The library was one of the first 10 libraries in Virginia and designed by a Virginia born man by the name of J. Stewart Barney. The center piece of the library is the stained glass dome, and also is all original. Library goers past and present appreciate the historic building and the story it tells.
“The library recently has gotten a large request from a lady who in the 1920’s as a child , her mother bought her and her sister to the library and she had such a fond memory of the library that she left us a large donation before she passed away,” Richie says.
The library was a gift to the city of Winchester by judge John Handley, who died in 1895, leaving 250 thousand dollars for the library and area schools.
“The vision that judge John Handley had for this sleepy little town of Winchester to build not only a magnificent building but to give us the services of a public library so that no matter your stage in life, you could improve yourself,” Richie says.
The library is on the National Register of Historic Places and each day the library staff finds out even more about its history.
If you’d like to learn more about the historic building, tours are given the first Wednesday and the third Saturday of each month.