Digital Library of Historical Directories, 1750-1919: London, 1808-1891

<P>Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.</P><p>The aim of the project was to improve access to local and trade directories for the period 1750-1919 by making a substantial collection of English and Welsh directories available online as a Digital Library of Historical Directories.<br>
This digital resource comprises in total some 600 directories, covering every English county together with Wales, and ranging widely over the period 1750-1919 (the latter cut-off point chosen for copyright reasons). There is a particular focus on the 1850s, 1890s and 1910s, with at least one directory provided for each county in each of these decades.<br>
The digitisation of the volumes involved a two-stage process, in which (1) the hard-copy source was scanned to produce a graphic image of each page, and then (2) those images were processed using OCR software to generate a machine-readable text file.</p><p><br></p><p>An <a href="http://specialcollections.le.ac.uk/digital/collection/p16445coll4" target="_blank">online version</a> of this resource can be found on the Website of the University of Leicester.<br>
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</p><br>This data collection includes the following directories:<br><br>- The Post-Office Annual Directory for 1808. Being a list of upwards of 16,000 merchants, traders, &amp;c. of London, and parts adjacent (1808)<br><br>- The Post Office London Directory, 1841. Comprising, amongst other information, street directory, commercial directory, trades' directory ... [Part 1: Street, Commercial, &amp; Trades Directories] (1841)<br><br>- The Post Office London Directory, 1841. Comprising, amongst other information, street directory, commercial directory, trades' directory ... [Part 2: Law, Court, &amp; Parliamentary Directories, etc.] (1841)<br><br>- The Small Edition of the Post Office London Directory, 1852. Comprising, amongst other information, official directory; commercial directory; court directory; parliamentary directory; postal directory; banking directory; &amp;c. (1851)<br><br>- The Post Office London Directory for 1882, comprising, amongst other information, official, street, commercial, trades, law, court, parliamentary, postal, city &amp; clerical, conveyance &amp; banking directories. [Part 1: Official &amp; Street Directories] (1882)<br><br>- The Post Office London Directory for 1882, comprising, amongst other information, official, street, commercial, trades, law, court, parliamentary, postal, city &amp; clerical, conveyance &amp; banking directories. [Part 2: Commercial &amp; Professional Directory] (1882)<br><br>- The Post Office London Directory for 1882, comprising, amongst other information, official, street, commercial, trades, law, court, parliamentary, postal, city &amp; clerical, conveyance &amp; banking directories. [Part 3: Trades &amp; Professional Directory] (1882)<br><br>- The Post Office London Directory for 1882, comprising, amongst other information, official, street, commercial, trades, law, court, parliamentary, postal, city &amp; clerical, conveyance &amp; banking directories. [Part 4: Law, Court &amp; Parliamentary Directories, etc.] (1882)<br><br>- The Business Directory of London and provincial and foreign trade guide (l'Annuaire du Commerce de Londres), 1884. [Part 1: Alphabetical Section] (1884)<br><br>- The Business Directory of London and provincial and foreign trade guide (l'Annuaire du Commerce de Londres), 1884. [Part 2: Classified Section and Provincial &amp; Foreign Register] (1884)<br><br>- The Post Office London Trades' Directory for 1891 (1891)<br><B>Main Topics</B>:<BR>The directories included are of many different kinds, commonly embracing trade, commercial, and private resident directories, together with gazetteers, almanacs, official information, etc. For the purposes of deposit in the UK Data Archive, the collection has been divided into 35 studies on a regional and temporal basis.<br>
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