Würzburg City Library

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Würzburg City Library
Falkenhaus with city library
founding 1872
Duration approx. 250,000 media
Library type library
place Wurzburg
ISIL DE-284
Website http://www.stadtbuecherei-wuerzburg.de

The Würzburg City Library or Max-Heim-Bücherei comprises the central library in the Falkenhaus and five district libraries in Würzburg . The system offers a total of around 200,000 media. With the E-Medien-Franken (formerly “Virtual City Library Würzburg”) the City Library Würzburg has an additional “branch” on the Internet, where customers can borrow media around the clock. The library also offers cultural events and numerous programs to promote language and reading.

Central library and district libraries

The head office is located in the Falkenhaus directly on the market square. It is named after its patron Max Heim (* 1853, † 1905, Kommerzienrat, not identical to the secret service officer of the same name). Books, magazines, audio CDs, CD-ROMS, DVDs, games and cards are offered there on four floors. There is also a reading café with a reading garden and a music library.

The five district libraries are located in the Würzburg districts of Heidingsfeld , Heuchelhof , Lengfeld , Versbach and Hubland . All district libraries function as neighborhood or parent-and-child libraries. They each have 7,000-10,000 media and serve as the first point of contact.

History of the city library

Development until 1945

The history of the Würzburg city library begins in 1872 when the Würzburg university professor Johann Baptist Schwab laid the foundation for a city library in the town hall with the foundation of his books. In 1905, Max Heim donated the sum of 157,000 gold marks to the construction of a public reading hall in Würzburg. In 1925, a city council resolution gave the modern public library the name of the municipal public library . This was relocated to the former theater restaurant, opened there on January 10, 1931 and was given full-time management for the first time.

In 1934 they moved into new rooms on the second floor of the left wing of the theater and on May 4, 1935 the municipal youth library was opened. A magazine and newspaper reading room was added in autumn 1936 and a music library in 1937. The manager of the Maria Orth library introduced events such as reading evenings, book exhibitions and the presentation of new publications from 1937. In 1939 the municipal public library was renamed the “City Library”.

Shortly before the end of World War II, the library was destroyed on March 16, 1945 during the Royal Air Force bombing and most of the books were destroyed.

post war period

The reopening took place in 1946. At that time the library was housed in the basement of the then provisional Mozart grammar school in Annastraße, where the Maria Ward Realschule is located today. Six years later, the library with around 35,000 volumes was able to move to the Falkenhaus. With the opening of the Heidingsfeld and Zellerau branches a year later, as well as the takeover of the Versbach community library and the Lengfeld youth library as part of the incorporation from 1978, the Würzburg city library expanded enormously. In 1988 the Heuchelhof branch opened. The renovation of the city library began five years later and the Falkenhof was torn down. In 1996 the library catalog was converted from a card catalog to an OPAC (a publicly accessible digital library catalog) and a year later public Internet access was made available for the first time. The city library received its first homepage. In 2000, the renovation of the city library was completed. On December 1, 2001, the library achieved a record usage when, for the first time in the history of the city library, more than a million books were loaned out within a calendar year. In 2002 the city library became the "absolute finalist" in the library of the year competition and thus the best city library in 2002 in Germany. A year later, it was also named Library of the Year 2003 . On March 20, 2004, the “Learning & Working” studio was opened with a ceremony.

E-media franc

Together with the Hamburg Public Library and the Cologne and Munich City Libraries, the Würzburg City Library was the first library in Europe to offer electronic media stocks for borrowing. The so-called “online loan offer” comprised almost 17,000 media consisting of e-books, e-music, e-audios, e-videos, e-magazines and e-papers. A system for digital rights management is used.

Key figures (as of 2019)

  • Visits: 506,703 (= 1,712 / opening day)
  • Loans total system 2018: 997,492 (of which 15.16% E / AV media)
  • Events in the city library 2019: 801

Prizes and awards

  • Four times (2003, 2005, 2006 and 2008) first place as the best large city library in the now discontinued nationwide performance comparison BIX (library index )
  • " Library of the Year " (2003)
  • “BayernOnline Prize” in the e-government category
  • Multiple seals of approval "Libraries - partner of schools"

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Sybille Grübel: Timeline of the history of the city from 1814-2006. In: Ulrich Wagner (Hrsg.): History of the city of Würzburg. 4 volumes, Volume I-III / 2, Theiss, Stuttgart 2001-2007; III / 1–2: From the transition to Bavaria to the 21st century. Volume 2, 2007, ISBN 978-3-8062-1478-9 , pp. 1225-1247; here: p. 1231.
  2. ^ Sybille Grübel: Timeline of the history of the city from 1814-2006. 2007, p. 1238.
  3. ↑ Peter Weidisch: Würzburg in the "Third Reich". In: Ulrich Wagner (Hrsg.): History of the city of Würzburg. 4 volumes, Volume I-III / 2, Theiss, Stuttgart 2001-2007; III / 1–2: From the transition to Bavaria to the 21st century. 2007, ISBN 978-3-8062-1478-9 , pp. 196-289 and 1271-1290; here: p. 261.
  4. ^ Sybille Grübel: Timeline of the history of the city from 1814-2006. In: Ulrich Wagner (Hrsg.): History of the city of Würzburg. 4 volumes, Volume I-III / 2, Theiss, Stuttgart 2001-2007; III / 1–2: From the transition to Bavaria to the 21st century. Volume 2, 2007, ISBN 978-3-8062-1478-9 , pp. 1225-1247; here: p. 1242.
  5. ^ BIX library index: Würzburg city library. Deutscher Bibliotheksverband eV, accessed on November 4, 2018 .

Coordinates: 49 ° 47 ′ 41.7 "  N , 9 ° 55 ′ 48.7"  E