More than 25,000 books and other materials are in five unique collections for reference and research. Plan your visit to the Special Collections at the Minneapolis Central Library.

The Minneapolis Collection covers all aspects of the city’s history and includes books, photographs, high school yearbooks, archival and manuscript collections, periodicals, maps, and thousands of files of newspaper clippings. Also includes information about how to research your Minneapolis home or property.

The Kittleson World War II Collection contains books on both theaters of the war, the home front, biographies, war-inspired fiction, and 2,000 digitized propaganda posters.

The Nineteenth Century American Studies Collection is comprised of 4,500 books and manuscripts, including first editions by such notable authors as Emerson, Thoreau and Longfellow.

The Huttner Abolition and Anti-Slavery Collection contains books by and about abolitionists such as William Lloyd Garrison, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Frederick Douglass.

The Hoag Mark Twain Collection is comprised of approximately 250 books, magazines, and pamphlets by or about Mark Twain.