On April 23 - Shakespeare's birthday - a copy of the First Folio will be on display at Sutton Library.

This is a major coup for the library and for FOLIO, who have - arranged the display as part of a breathtaking Shakespeare festival in Sutton.

The First Folio, published in 1623, is very rare and very valuable. This copy is owned by the Library of Birmingham.

How, you might be wondering, did Birmingham acquire an item of such financial and cultural value? It was all down to one man.

His name was Sam Timmins. I have written biographies of many Victorians, but I can honestly say that I have written about no nicer a man than Sam Timmins.

Sam loved a pint of ale, loved telling a good story and, above all, loved Shakespeare. He could recite in full every play that Shakespeare wrote. He bought many hundreds of books about Shakespeare and the history of Birmingham - and, deeply generous, eventually gave them to Birmingham reference library. This was not a private library - there was one of those in Sutton - but a public library, open to everyone.

That was central to Timmins' vision.

Sam's closest friend was the charismatic and highly influential preacher George Dawson. Sam suggested to Dawson that Birmingham should mark the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's birthday by creating a library containing every work written by or about the Bard. Other towns put on plays or commissioned busts. Birmingham opened the Shakespeare Memorial Library on April 23 1868.

What Sam thought would be the centrepiece of the library would be a copy of the First Folio. Before this happened, however, much of the library's collection was destroyed in a fire in January 1879. Sam was seen sobbing outside as his life's work was destroyed. However, the library was rebuilt and, when it reopened in June 1882, a copy of the First Folio had been acquired. It was the first book to be requested.

At Sam's funeral in November 1902, no flowers were placed on his grave apart from a bunch of rosemary from the garden of Shakespeare's birthplace. I have told the story of this extraordinary man in a new book called George Dawson and his circle.

Associate Professor
Stephen Roberts