Virtual reference library

Online reference and information

Accessing the resources

You can access a range of free online reference resources using your library membership.  You will need a Gloucestershire library card with a number that starts with 77 e.g. 771234123x or 7712341234. 

If your card has a different pattern of numbering please contact us using this link: https://www.gloucestershire.gov.uk/libraries/contact-the-library/ 

Some resources can be accessed from anywhere using library membership, while others can only be accessed from a library computer.  Please see details below.

Resources that can be accessed from anywhere using library membership:

You can log on to the following sites on any computer, using your Gloucestershire library card number. If you don't have a library card, join the library or update your details

• Ancestry - Gloucestershire records digitised by Ancestry
• Newsbank

  - provides access to news articles from across the world from reliable sources.Includes local and national newspapers.

   

   

• Times Digital Archive search 1785 - 31st December 2013
• 19th Century newspapers - search national and regional newspapers
• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography - 57,000 biographies
• Oxford Reference
• Naxos Music Library 600,000 music tracks
• Theory test Pro- theory driving test
• GoCitizen- pass the Life in the UK test

Resources that can be accessed from any Gloucestershire library using library membership:

• Access to Research - For private study use only. Users may print a single copy of an article (usual printing costs apply). Content must not be copied or saved elsewhere. Misuse may result in your computer session being terminated.
• Ancestry - Includes Gloucestershire Parish Registers. If you would like to use Ancestry from home you will need to subscribe to Ancestry.co.uk
• Find My Past - UK family history records
• British Newspaper Archive - Register for access to 742 newspaper titles & explore over 200 years of history

Resources that can only be accessed from Cheltenham and Gloucester Libraries:

• Which? Online

Resources that can only be accessed from Gloucester Library:

• FAME - Business database

Other useful websites for county library users

Some of these websites can be used from home with your library card and some can only be used in a library.

• John Johnson Collection - an archive of printed ephemera -access using your library card
• BFI Screen online - guide to British film and TV history. From Library PCs only