The national library is notable for being the repository of original copies of José Rizal's Noli Me Tangere, El Filibusterismo and Mi último adiós.

[2][3] It opened on October 24, 1891, at the Intendencia in Intramuros, then home of the Manila Mint (as the Casa de la Moneda), with around 100 volumes and with both Julian Romero and Benito Perdiguero as director and archivist-librarian, respectively.

[2] At the same time, the ACL, acting on its mandate to make its collections available to American servicemen stationed in the Philippines, established five traveling libraries, serving various, if not unusual, clientele across the islands.

1407 placed the library under the Bureau of Education and subsequently moved to its headquarters at the corner of Cabildo (now Muralla) and Recoletos Streets in Intramuros, on which today the offices of the Manila Bulletin stand.

[5] The newly formed National Library was placed under the supervision of the Philippine Assembly, subsequently moving to the Legislative Building on Padre Burgos Street in Ermita.

[2] The dawn of World War II and the subsequent invasion of the Philippines by the Japanese had no significant impact on the National Library, with the institution still remaining open and the government at the time making few significant changes to the library, such as the abolition of the Research and Bibliography Division and the subsequent suspension of work on the national bibliography [de] in 1941.

Two weeks later, however, Japanese troops also moved to occupy that building as well, with the same commanding officer giving library officials only until that afternoon to vacate the premises.

However, most of the library's Filipiniana collection, having been overlooked by moving staff and due to time constraints, was left behind at the Philippine Normal School.

Most of the library's collections were either destroyed by fires as a result of the ensuing battle between American, Filipino and Japanese forces, lost or stolen by looters afterward.

I was very happy because I knew that this second box contained the original manuscripts of the Noli, the Fili and the Último Adiós.Word of the books' discovery by Tumaneng was relayed to professor H. Otley Beyer, then chairman of the Committee on Salvage of Government Libraries, through officer-in-charge Luis Montilla.

However, much to their surprise, the entire collection stored under Manila City Hall disappeared, lost to looters who ransacked the ruins of public buildings.

[2] With the return of Commonwealth rule, the National Library reopened and relocated to the site of the Old Bilibid Prison (today the Manila City Jail) on Oroquieta Street in Santa Cruz while the Legislative Building was being restored.

[5] The name change was done reportedly out of a sense of national shame as a result of World War II, with Roxas preferring to emphasize the library's administrative responsibilities over its cultural and historical functions.

In 1953, two folders of Rizaliana (works pertaining to José Rizal) previously in the possession of a private Spanish citizen which contained, among others, Rizal's transcript of records, a letter from his mother, Teodora Alonso, and a letter from his wife, Josephine Bracken, were returned by the Spanish government as a gesture of friendship and goodwill.

[7][5] Although no major changes occurred in the National Library immediately after its relocation, two significant events took place in the 1970s: first, the issuance of Presidential Decree No.

[9] Having suspected widespread pilferage upon assuming the directorship in 1992, then-Director Adoracion B. Mendoza sought the assistance of the National Bureau of Investigation in recovering the stolen items.

[11] The chief of the Filipiniana Division at the time, Maria Luisa Moral, who was believed to be involved in the scandal, was dismissed on September 25,[2] but subsequently acquitted on May 29, 2008.

[11] Following Bayhon's arrest, Mendoza made several appeals calling on the Filipino people to return items pilfered from the library's collections without criminal liability.

[9] In 1995, the National Library launched its local area network, consisting of a single file server and four workstations, and subsequently its online public access catalog (named Basilio, after the character in Rizal's novels) in 1998,[2] as well as its website on March 15, 2001.

Following the retirement of Mendoza in 2001, Prudenciana C. Cruz was appointed director and has overseen the continued computerization of its facilities, including the opening of the library's Internet room on July 23, 2001.

[16] During construction, objections were raised over the library's location, claiming that the salinity of the air around Manila Bay would hasten the destruction of the rare books and manuscripts that would be stored there.

Despite the objections, construction still continued,[16] and the new building was inaugurated on June 19, 1961, Rizal's 100th birthday, by President Carlos P. Garcia, Magsaysay's successor.

Accounted in its collections include valuable Rizaliana pieces, four incunabula, the original manuscript of Lupang Hinirang (the National Anthem),[19] several sets of The Philippine Islands, 1493–1898, a collection of rare Filipiniana books previously owned by the Compañía General de Tabacos de Filipinas, and the documents of five Philippine Presidents.

[2] The most prized possessions of the National Library, which include Rizal's Noli Me Tangere, El Filibusterismo and Mi último adiós, three of his unfinished novels and the Philippine Declaration of Independence, are kept in a special double-combination vault at the rare documents section of the Filipiniana Division's reading room.