Love letters to libraries: Robin Ince, Meg Rosoff and other famous names check in

In 1971, a librarian in Michigan asked public figures to write to local children explaining why their new library was a good thing. For National Libraries Day on 6 February in the UK, writers and public figures have written love letters to theirs

In 1971 Marguerite Hart, a children’s librarian in the city of Troy, Michigan, asked public figures to write to local children about why their new library was important. She wrote wide and dreamed big, sending requests all over the world to artists, writers, politicians – even pontiffs – and what came back was a veritable who’s-who in history: Dr Seuss, Pope Paul VI, Neil Armstrong, Kingsley Amis and Isaac Asimov responded, to name but a few of the 97.

Related: ‘A library is like a room full of friends’: stars' letters to young readers

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