The University of Florida’s Baldwin Library of Historical Children’s Literature has an extensive collection of children’s books from the 19th century, which they have digitized and made available free of charge.
The Baldwin Library of Historical Children’s Literature in the Department of Special Collections at the University of Florida’s George A. Smathers Libraries contains more than 130,000 books and periodicals published in the United States and Great Britain from the mid-1600s to present day. The Library also has manuscript collections, original artwork, and assorted ephemera such as board games, puzzles, and toys. The Baldwin Library is known for comparative editions of books, with special emphasis on Robinson Crusoe, Pilgrim’s Progress, Aesop’s Fables, and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. The Library also has the largest collection of Early American Juvenile Imprints of any academic institution in the United States.
Other strengths and distinctions of the Baldwin Library include: marginalia and inscriptions, the Hans Christian Andersen Awards Collection, Little Golden Books, religious tracts, and illustrated editions from the Golden Age of Children’s Literature. Scholars worldwide use the Baldwin Library for research in fables, fairy tales, alphabet books, morality tales and religious tracts, conduct of life, gender roles, comparison of editions, adve
nture stories, and boys’/girls’ series books.
See all of the books in the library catalog for the Baldwin Library (over 87,
000 catalogued books) and see only the digitized books. See also, annotated list of selected genre terms for children’s literature.