This Tuesday marked the 102nd anniversary of the inauguration of the National Library.

The first state, public and secular institution in Albania was founded on July 10, 1920. At the time of inauguration, the National Library had 6,000 book titles.

The first director of the library was the linguist and journalist, Karl Gurakuqi.

Throughout the period of the Albanian kingdom, in the years 1928-1937, the activity of the library stood out under the direction of the “father” of Albanian librarianship, Sotir Kolea.

The end of World War II found BKSH with a collection of 15,000 volumes.

Whereas, at the end of 1947, its fund numbered about 100,000 volumes.

With the fall of the dictatorial regime, the library began to remove barriers in providing information and in using some categories of literature.