John Rylands Library has been extended four times, the first time to designs by Champneys in 1920 after the project was delayed by World War I. The Lady Wolfson Building opened in 1962 on the west side and a third extension, south of the first was built in 1969. In January 2003, an appeal to renovate the building was launched. Funds were generated from grants from the University of Manchester and Heritage Lottery Fund and donations from members of the public and companies in Manchester. The project, Unlocking the Rylands, demolished the third extension, refurbished parts of the old building and erected a
John Rylands other benefactions he established and maintained orphanages, homes for aged gentlewomen, a home of rest for ministers of slender means, and he provided a town hall, public baths, library and a coffeehouse in the town of Stretford, where he lived. He also built an institute for the benefit of the villagers of Havenstreet on the Isle of Wight, where Rylands passed some of his later years from 1882, having built a house named Longford there after his mainland estate. His donations to the poor of Rome were so generous as to induce the king to decorate him in 1880 with