Chapbooks and Pantomime Ephemera Tell Story of Dick Whittington in New Exhibition

The first library at London's Guildhall was founded by money bequeathed by former Lord Mayor of the City of London Richard 'Dick' Whittington who gained a reputation as an astute medieval merchant, politician, and philanthropist.

The question of whether or not Richard Whittington was also keen on felines will be covered in Whittington: The Man, The Myth and The Cat which runs at the City of London Corporation’s public reference library October 7 - April 2025. The free exhibition will use chapbooks, children’s books, and works relating to pantomimes, most of which were donated to the library by prolific book collector Ellery Yale Wood in 2016.

Yale Wood was a New Yorker from a wealthy Pennsylvania Quaker background who moved to England in the 1950s and developed a serious collecting habit. On her death, she left her collection of several thousand children's books to her former school, Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania, and her collection "which relates to Dick Whittington and his cat” to Guildhall Library. Among the more than 300 items dating from the 17th century to the 20th century it includes plays, poems, portraits, theatre programmes, lantern slides and puzzles. 

Taking a detailed look at Richard Whittington’s life and the legends that have grown up around him, the exhibition will investigate the true story behind the rags-to-riches tale of a penniless orphan who transformed not just himself, but also the City of London.

Visitors to the exhibition will learn how Whittington loaned money to monarchs Richard II, Henry IV, and Henry V nearly 60 times, and paid for the building of public lavatories at St Martin Vintry, a refuge for unmarried mothers at St Thomas’ Hospital, the rebuilding of Newgate Prison, and the establishment of the first library at Guildhall. They will also discover how the myth of the cat took hold in the 17th century. One possibility is that it may be a result of a play on words – a fleet of boats used for import and export were known as “cattes” or “cat”, it being a mistranslation of the French word, ‘achat’, for trade.

Most famously, Richard Whittington was appointed as Lord Mayor (and later, elected in his own right) in 1397 and re-elected in 1406 and 1419. On September 5, 1421, a widower and childless, Richard Whittington drew up his will and left his entire fortune of £7,500 - the equivalent of around £7.5m today - to charity. He died on March 23 or 24, 1423.

“Most of us have heard of Dick Whittington and enjoyed watching the pantomime but, beyond remembering that Richard Whittington was Lord Mayor three times and mentioning a cat, few people will know a great deal about him," said Chairman of the City of London Corporation’s Culture, Heritage and Libraries Committee, Munsur Ali. “As it approaches its 600th anniversary, this exhibition at Guildhall Library will feel like a love letter to the remarkable man who was responsible for its creation, and whose generosity benefitted Londoners during his lifetime and continues to this day via charitable causes.”