Books from Britain's oldest subscription library have been found permanent homes as a unique slice of social history.

The bulk of the 3,000-plus books, which remained largely untouched for the last 20 years in the library at Westgate, in Weardale, County Durham, will be put into storage by the county's library service.

A leather-bound ledger, dating back to 1788 and listing the original membership of the library, has gone to the county archivists' office.

But valuable volumes relating to the development of the lead-mining industry in the dale will be going on display at the nearby Weardale Museum at Ireshopeburn.

A small wooden box containing four keys, each held by a trustee of the library so valuable documents could only be examined when all four were present, has also gone to the museum.

"What is very important," said Brian Hunter, secretary of the trustees, "is that the bulk of the library is going to be kept intact by being stored away by the county library service.

"There is no doubt it is an important piece of social history, which demonstrates the reading habits of generations of lead miners and their families here in Weardale."

In its infancy, a lot of the books in the library - set in two bedrooms of a terrace house in Westgate - were about Methodism. But tastes changed to Victorian romances and even 1950s cowboy books.

In its heyday in the 1930s, said Mr Hunter, the library had 300 members.

But, with the closure of the lead mines of Weardale, its use dwindled until no books were borrowed at all.

It was left to the library's custodian of 55 years, Florence Hodgson, to dust the books and old desks and reflect on the past - "in the early days it used to take me a week to dust the shelves. I can remember up to 140 people a week coming in for books," she said.

With the library's closure in June last year, Mrs Hodgson moved into a new home in Westgate.

In appreciation of her long service, the village presented her with a television set and micro-wave.

And the old library? It's now up for sale for £25,000.