Ida May Berry (1884-1959) lived in West Didsbury, near Manchester when she wrote this diary. Here, she describes her 20th birthday. 20 November 1904 My twentieth birthday. Mother gave me a lovely curb bracelet, & a box of beautiful plums, Maud [the diarist’s sister] gave me a box of fried fruits, & Baby [the diarist’s other sister] a box of chocolates, and a box of dates. Aunt gave me a birthday card, and five shillings. My face was awfully swollen, & none of us went to chapel in the morning, but I mended up, & went in the “choir” at [...]

The collection currently contains:  Almost 3000 volumes of manuscript diaries written by more than 130 individuals, running from 1735 to 2013.  Around 2000 volumes of published diaries, including fiction and non-fiction, and including a number of guides and anthologies.

Dear Diaroid Lover, The image of the new beautiful diary we have received is only half of it! The diary dates to 1754. It contains a list of remedies, including one, written in ironically faded ink, ‘To Recover the Ink of Old Deeds’: Take five or six galls finely powdered and pat them into a pint of Mountain Wine, & let them stand together three or four days in an appothecary’s [sic] sand heat to digest. Strike the dull part of the writing over with a plain pencil dipd [sic] in the liquor and it will recover them. Just to [...]

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/the-great-diary-project-the-survival-of-the-permanent-life-archive-9334751.html

Extraordinary diaries from Australia

The Great Diary Project at the Museum of Childhood, Bethnal Green, London: 17 May – 12 October 2014 Using documents from The Great Diary Project archive at Bishopsgate Institute, this exhibition offers insights into the lives of children and teenagers at particular moments in history. The diaries on display date from 1813 to 1996, showing changes in attitudes over time and demonstrating how an individual's unique voice can be captured in this very private kind of writing. On public display for the first time, they include tales of flogging and bed bugs at boarding school during the Napoleonic Wars, early twentieth [...]