MORE than 500 people were welcomed to a library as part of their 50th anniversary celebrations.

Abergele library opened on their current site, at Market Street, on January 1 1969.

To celebrate, the venue hosted a talk by Dr Mark Baker about his latest book - Gwrych Castle An Official Guide - and an open day was held on Thursday, January 10 which featured quilters, a creative writing session and a reading of The Very Hungry Caterpillar which was also published in 1969.

Judith Griffith read from The Hungry Caterpillar, which is also 50 years old this year. There is a story in the library every Monday at 10 am. Picture: Kerry Roberts, KR100119c.

Little ones from Cylch Meithrin Abergele listened to the story, which was told by assistant librarian Judith Griffith. They then formed a caterpillar to tour the library.

Myfanwy Jones, librarian, said: "The celebrations went really well. We had 500 people visit throughout the event.

"We had a full house when Mark Baker paid a visit. As a child, he used to visit the library.

"The children enjoyed the hungry caterpillar story and formed a conga and made a caterpillar out of paper chains. We also had a real birthday party celebration as we had cake."

Emyr Morris showed off his private collection of local history. Picture: Kerry Roberts, KR100119c

Visitors enjoyed a display by Penrhos quilters and browsed through Emyr Morris’s local history archive. There was an opportunity to learn about how the Fair Trade steering group operates.

Talking about his private history collection, Emyr said: "It started as a hobby in 1980. I now have 14 A3 size albums showing the history of Conwy to Towyn.

"People thoroughly enjoy looking at them and I now visit local groups to talk about them."

Padmini Muthukumar of Penrhos Patchers which meets in the library every Wednesday. The quilt to the right was made by a community group to raise money for a scanner at Bodelwyddan hospital. It now hangs in the town council. Picture: Kerry Roberts, KR100119c.

A memory board was also created on the day, visitors looked through the ‘Last Abergele mart fair and sale day’ photo album by Mel Parry and joined Diane Woodraw for an informal creative writing session.

Myfanwy added: "It was just non stop all day.

"The memory board gave people a chance to say why they moved to Abergele to live and how their children had come to the library and there was some old photos.

The quilt was made by a community group to raise money for a scanner at Bodelwyddan hospital. It now hangs in the town council. Picture: Kerry Roberts, KR100119c.

"There is an interesting story with the quilt [the black and white photograph]. This was created in the 1980s. It was won as a raffle prize and then was bought in an auction and came back to Abergele.

"A lot of the group have come back together and remember the quilt."

The quilt had been raffled off as back then, it had been made to raise money for a scanner at Bodelwyddan hospital.

Penrhos quilters meet at the library every Wednesday.