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	Waterville, Maine’s library opened in 1902, funded with a $20,000 grant from Andrew Carnegie. It remains in use.
	The City of Parsons, Kansas, is currently planning to renovate its former Carnegie Library as the new Carnegie Arts Center.
	The Cleburne Carnegie library is one of only 13 of the 32 Carnegie libraries built in Texas still standing. It houses displays related to the early history of Johnson County.
	Bellevue Avenue Branch of the Montclair Public Library.

From 1896 to 1925 the number of public libraries in the United States exploded, growing from about 900 to 3,900. Much of the credit can be given to steel magnate Andrew Carnegie, who provided grants for the construction of 1,679 libraries in 49 states – only Rhode Island was somehow left out! About 70 percent of the Carnegie libraries were built in small towns with fewer than 10,000 people.

Carnegie’s philanthropy was premised on a belief (expressed in his book, The Gospel of Wealth) that all personal wealth beyond that required to supply the needs of one’s family should be regarded as a trust to be administered for the benefit of the community.

As Theodore Jones notes in Carnegie Libraries Across America: A Public Legacy (John Wiley & Sons, 1997), “Carnegie libraries played a formative role in education, as well as civic politics, finance, and artistic and social developments. ... Carnegie’s grant stipulations fostered the now-unquestioned concept that it is a governmental duty to provide tax monies to support public libraries. ... In many towns, Carnegie libraries were the only large public buildings in town, and they became hubs of social activities like concerts, lectures, and meetings.”

“Libraries are important anchors both to a downtown and to a neighborhood center.

Historically, libraries and early museums used to be part of City Hall. Now, they are cultural institutions in their own right, but should function as an integral component of a civic heart, not separate or removed from it.”

– Roberta Brandes Gratz,
Cities: Back from the Edge

The Carnegie grants were an early example of the now common practice of requiring local matching commitments. As Jones explains, “to be eligible, a community had to demonstrate the need for a public library, provide the building site, and promise to support library services and maintenance with tax funds equal to 10 percent of the grant annually. Thus, a $10,000 grant required the town to dedicate $1,000 in support each year. ... In the long term, these stipulations made public libraries a civic responsibility, just like schools and police protection.”

While Carnegie provided the construction funds, each community was responsible for the design of its library. Most cities and towns hired top notch architects, who designed beautiful structures, most of which still stand today as centerpieces of their community.

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The Carnegie library in Fairfield, Iowa, built in 1893, was the very first of the Carnegie libraries built outside the Pittsburgh area.		Designed by noted architect Daniel H. Burnham, the Carnegie library, located in the center of Joliet, Illinois today houses over 300,000 books.

Reprinted with permission from the Winter 2001 issue of the Planning Commissioners Journal which focused on the role of public buildings, including libraries, in cities and towns. To order this back issue, go to: www.plannersweb.com/contents/toc41.html

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