at the Court House and at a temporary reading room at the Boys' School in Murray Street. A site for a Mechanics Institute building in Howick St (later Hay St) was gifted by the government and surveyed in August 1851. The land was vested in trustees, and managed by a committee appointed by its members. The corner stone for the new building was laid by Governor Fitzgerald on 25 May 1852. Moves to establish a permanent museum in the city during the 1880s saw the Institute's specimen collections move to premises at the recently closed Perth Gaol in 1892. These collections laid the foundations of what became the Western Australian Museum. In 1899 the original building was replaced by spacious two storey premises on the same site, which included a concert hall with seating for 400 people and a lodge room with accommodation for another 200. The building's architect was William G. Wolf, who also designed His Majesty's Theatre and Hotel in Hay Street. The foundation stone for the new building was laid by the Premier Sir John Forrest on 20 June 1898. The premier was a former Institute president. The West Australian described the building: [The hall] is a magnificent apartment, 70 feet x 31 feet, with platform, dressing rooms, and so forth. This and all the rooms on the same floor facing the street have French casements opening on to the balcony which surrounds the building. The edifice is in the Italian style of architecture, and the main entrance to the institute is from Hay Street. There are six shops in the building facing the same street, and a block of offices in Pier-street for letting purposes. The room in which the lending library is to be situated is 40ft. x 25ft., and faces Pier street, and the reading room measures 40ft. x 24ft. At the time of its opening in 1899, the library contained 6,000 volumes and membership was 389. The cost of the building was £10,721. Perth Literary Institute Its name was changed to Perth Literary Institute in December 1909 and at about the same time its inventory showed the library to contain 564 books related to history; biography, 359; essays, 382; travel and geography, 421; general science, 275; social science, philosophy, and theology, 238; poetry and the drama, 199; serial and miscellaneous, 333; statistical and works of reference, 398; and fiction, 6,274, and a grand