In 1903, "Steel King" Andrew Carnegie pledged $250,000—today's equivalent of eight million dollars—for seven new branch library buildings in the City of Cleveland. One of the existing branches that was intended to benefit from the pledge was the West Side branch library. Opened in 1892, it was Cleveland's first branch library. Since 1898, it had occupied a building on Franklin Boulevard near Pearl (West 25th) Street. The building—still standing and known today as the "Cinecraft Building"—had been designed and built for the branch, but was owned by People's Savings Bank which leased it to Cleveland Public Library. Just two days after the newspapers reported Carnegie's pledge, a Cleveland Plain Dealer article pointed to the Cleveland Public Library Board of Trustees' plan to use part of the donation to relocate the West Side branch to the northwest corner of Pearl and Lorain Street (Avenue), where the old Pearl Street Market stood. The City of Cleveland was in the process of planning to construct a new West Side Market right across Pearl Street from old one, and the Library offered that, if the City would donate the old market property to it, the Library would expend $50,000 of the Carnegie funds to construct a new library building on the property that would feature a large auditorium for the public. The Library's proposal to site the new West Side branch library across the street from where the new West Side Market was to be built drew an immediate and negative public response. At least four different groups of residents and/or business owners protested the proposal and recommended various other locations for the new branch library. One of these groups felt so strongly that, on June 8, 1903, two hundred of its members traveled downtown to Cleveland Public Library's main building, which then stood on the southeast corner of Wood (East 3rd) Street and Rockwell Street (Avenue). There they protested outside—while the Board held a meeting inside—each member wearing a silk badge that read: "Branch Library, Corner Clark Avenue and Lorain Street." As a result of the widespread public opposition, the Library abandoned its Pearl Street market site proposal and instead referred the matter to a committee for additional study and recommendations. Nearly two years passed before the Library's Board of Trustees, after reviewing its committee's recommendations, decided in 1905 to site the new West Side branch library on Fulton Road (then, Rhodes Avenue), just north of Lorain Avenue. This was then a central location in a fast growing area of the West Side that was centered upon the Lorain Avenue commercial corridor. In a few years, the intersection of Lorain and Fulton would become known as Lorain-Fulton Square. The Board purchased three lots on Fulton, no more than 100 feet from Lorain, and was prepared to begin the construction process when, once again, the West Side public intervened. In the same month that the Library completed the purchase of its lots on Fulton, the West Side Improvement Association (WSIA), an organization of business owners and other prominent West Side individuals, held a meeting at the Catholic Club, on Bridge Avenue just west of historic St. Patrick Catholic Church.  Some 400 people, including Librarian William H. Brett, reportedly attended. There, a proposal was made for the City to purchase additional land on Fulton north of the lots that the Library had purchased; use the Library's lots to extend Kentucky (West 38th) Street from Bridge to Fulton; and then create a park in the resulting triangular-shaped piece of land where the new West Side branch could then be sited. Ward 3 Councilman Thomas Croke, in whose ward the library and park would be located, agreed to introduce a City Council resolution to direct the City administration to explore the feasibility and cost of such a  plan. Cleveland City Council adopted the WSIA park proposal resolution, and ultimately, it resulted in an additional two and one-half years of delay in the siting and building of the new West Side branch library. During that period, City Park Engineer William Stinchcomb, who later became known as the "Father of the Cleveland Metroparks," floated an idea of making the proposed library park a "civic center" where statues of prominent literary figures could be placed. He suggested that the Schiller-Goethe monument, which stood in the way of the soon-to-be-built Cleveland Museum of Art, could be moved from Wade Park to the new library park to represent Germany's contributions to world literature. Stinchcomb's proposal, a forerunner to the Cleveland Cultural Gardens, was never acted upon and the Schiller-Goethe monument was destined to remain where it was until it was relocated to the German Cultural Garden in 1929.  By 1907, the delay in planning and constructing the new West Side branch library was not the only problem facing the Library. It had exhausted nearly all of  Andrew Carnegie's 1903 donation in building the first five of the proposed seven new branches, and now, moreover, there were substantial additional expenses projected to be incurred by the City and Library in purchasing the land needed for the library park, building the Kentucky Street extension, creating the park in which the library would be located, and then actually building the new branch.  These expenses easily could have doomed the project. However, in a sign of how much he valued both the branch library project itself and Librarian Brett as a resource, Andrew Carnegie stepped in and made additional donations to ensure that the new West Side branch library would be built. 

After learning from Brett that building the first five branches had exhausted the original donation, Carnegie agreed to donate an additional $123,000 to construct the last two branches—the new West Side Branch library and new South Branch library. In 1908, in order to ensure that there were sufficient funds to enable the City to purchase the land for the park and the Kentucky Street extension, he donated an additional $110,000. Without these last two donations, it is questionable whether the West Side branch library would ever have been built, let alone in the grand form of the building that sits on Fulton Road today. James Bertram, Andrew Carnegie's personal secretary, noted how extraordinary the first of these two additional donations were in a letter he wrote to the Library on July 2, 1907:  "Mr. Carnegie congratulates Cleveland upon exceeding even Pittsburg in proportion to the amount of population, in Library appropriation, placing Cleveland first of all." 

With the all-important land acquired, construction of the new West Side branch library (appropriately renamed Carnegie West in a nod to Carnegie's 1908 donation) began in the fall of that year and was completed in the spring of 1910. Designed by New York architect Edward L. Tilton in a modified Renaissance style with classical elements, the new branch was built in a triangular shape, with a facade composed of red brick, limestone and terra cotta. It has banded and fluted columns and pilasters in the Ionic style. With an interior covering 25,000 square feet of space, Carnegie West was Cleveland's largest branch library building. It had weathered oak finish and walls adorned with carbon prints of famous pictures and noted buildings. A majority of the rooms also had plaster friezes. There were balconies in the children's and reference rooms. An auditorium in the basement seated 650 persons. The new library was dedicated and officially opened to the public in May. Several months later, library experts from the American Library Association visited Cleveland to see the new branch library. According to an article appearing in the Plain Dealer on July 29, 1910, they unanimously declared, "for general attractiveness, facilities for circulating books, up-to-date interior equipment, method of handling the books and the ability of those on the staff, the West Side institution, for a branch library, stood without a peer anywhere in the United States." In the course of its long history, one of the library's most endearing traditions has been its service to the segment of the neighborhood population with the greatest educational needs, viz., immigrants and other non-English speakers.  When the branch library opened in 1910, that group was largely composed of Hungarian immigrants who had been moving into the neighborhood since the late 19th century. Carnegie West staff welcomed them by providing books in their native language, sponsoring their cultural events at the library or in Library Park, and by offering classes in English. When World War I intervened and caused many Americans to question the loyalty of Hungarians and other recent immigrants from eastern and southern Europe, the Cleveland Public librarians, including those at Carnegie West, responded with their own version of "Americanization," which showed a respect for the culture, language and traditions of the newcomers and offered their services and materials to help them navigate their new life in this country.  In the second half of the 20th century, Puerto Ricans and other Spanish speaking people began to move into the Ohio City neighborhood, gradually replacing the Hungarian-Americans as the largest ethnic group of non-English speakers. Just as it had for Hungarian residents, Carnegie West provided books in their native language and offered the library as a place to hold cultural events. In 1992, when Carnegie West celebrated the 100th anniversary of the opening of the first West Side branch library, the celebration included a demonstration of traditional Hispanic and Hungarian dances. As the library aged in the second half of the twentieth century and the population of the Ohio City neighborhood shrank, the Library Board of Trustees was forced to weigh whether to retain the large library building or tear it down and replace it with a smaller building "better sized" for the neighborhood.  When this was proposed in 1979, West Side residents turned out in opposition to the proposal just as they had some seven decades earlier. Cleveland Public Library listened and decided instead to renovate and remodel the historic building, reducing its interior space in half, even though the cost of doing so was greater than that of constructing a smaller replacement.  In the ensuing years, other major repairs and renovations have been made to the building, including the 2004 repainting of the interior walls to their original colors. Today, 113 years after it first opened to the public, Carnegie West remains an architectural jewel in the Lorain-Fulton area and an important civic and cultural center for the entire Ohio City neighborhood.

For more (including 24 images) view the original article

The structure on the northwest corner of Clark Avenue and Scranton Road was closed for more than five years, during which time library officials, architects, community development organizations and neighborhood residents worked to reconcile views of the building’s future and subsequently orchestrate a massive renovation. But it all worked: At the age of 107, one of Cleveland’s original Carnegie Libraries was reborn.

The South Branch Library story predates Andrew Carnegie’s largess. The first library in the vicinity opened in 1897 in a rented building on the corner of Clark Avenue and Joseph Street (changed to West 20th Street in 1906 and Twinkie Lane in 1976). It was yellow brick with stone trimmings. Oak desks, bookcases and tables held as many as 7,000 volumes. Books were fumigated in 1901-02 due to a smallpox epidemic.

In 1903 the Cleveland Public Library “branch building program” was launched with a $250,000 gift from Andrew Carnegie. By 1914 a total of $590,000 was received. These monies ultimately underwrote the construction of 14 library branches: Broadway, Brooklyn, Carnegie West, East 79th Street, Hough, Jefferson, Lorain, Miles Park, Quincy, St. Clair, Sterling, Superior, Woodland and, of course, “South.” Each branch had its own collection of books and a full complement of librarians and assistants. More than 100 years later, the Brooklyn, Carnegie West, Jefferson, Lorain, Sterling and South buildings are still being used as libraries.

South Branch was the eighth to be built and the first Carnegie facility in the city to be made of stone rather than brick. Described as English Gothic on the outside and Tudor on the inside, it opened on June 12, 1911. Total cost for the land and building was $71,800. Architect Henry Whitfield, who previously designed Tufts College in Massachusetts and myriad other Carnegie libraries, cited Hoghton Tower in Lancashire, England, as his inspiration for South Branch.

The building is constructed of rough-hewn gray limestone and features a rectangular framed front entrance and windows. Crenellations (castle-like cutouts) line the roof parapet. An octagonal skylight over a central court gives the interior a remarkable “outside” feel. Fireplace tiles—designed in a style called “Medieval Decoratives”—were made by Moravian Pottery & Tile Works in Bucks County, Pennsylvania.

When South Branch opened, the neighborhood primarily comprised German, Bohemian and American-born families. By 1924 many long-term residents had moved on, replaced by a wider variety of immigrants. Around that time, 21 different nationalities were represented in the South Branch register.

In the 1960s, the South Branch community was dealt a variety of serious blows: Most severe were the construction of Interstate 71 several hundred yards to the east and Interstate 90/490 roughly the same distance to the north. Hundreds of area homes were destroyed and the library was symbolically separated from thousands of neighbors. An ongoing residential exodus (an estimated population drop of 31 percent from 1960 to 1970) further reduced the library’s patronage.

Today, South Branch is one of two libraries serving a recovering Tremont neighborhood as well as visitors from surrounding communities such as Clark-Fulton, Stockyards and Ohio City. The population served by the library is still smaller than it was several generations ago, but the range of services it provides and the strength of support it receives from neighbors and patrons are greater than ever.

“The only thing that you absolutely have to know is the location of the library.” —Albert Einstein

For more (including 10 images) view the original article

The Cleveland Public Library comprises one of the largest collections in the United States: nearly ten million items. The Library’s two buildings on Superior Avenue (the main structure, 1925) and the Stokes Wing (1997) command an entire city block between East 3rd and East 6th Streets. The exceptional collection and iconic buildings demonstrate both the institution's importance as a symbol of democracy and—at a more pragmatic level—the library's popularity.

The development of the Cleveland Public Library mirrored a larger movement in the United States: merging practices from tax-funded school-district libraries with early circulating libraries that required fees or membership dues. Heavily laden in classist ideals of democracy, these early public libraries became increasingly popular in the last decade of the 19th century. The advancement of publicly funded libraries also was a response to rapid social changes—particularly industrialization and a tidal wave of immigrants. Thus public lending institutions focused largely on maintaining large collections of educational materials, even though limited operating hours and a closed-stack system limited their accessibility.

Cleveland's first public library was founded in 1869, following the passage of a law providing library funding as part of the Cleveland school system. Known until 1883 as the Public School Library, the new institution on the third floor of a building off West Superior Avenue was estimated to have 5,800 books on its opening day. Visitors to the 20 x 80-foot room had to submit their requests at a main counter. The item would then be retrieved from the stacks by an employee of the library. This system remained in place until 1884, when William Howard Brett was appointed librarian. Under Brett's direction, the institution became a model for progressive, service-oriented libraries throughout the United States, a fact that led to its popular nickname "The People's University."

The notion of accessibility lay at the core of Brett’s innovations. He made all materials in the adult sections available to the public. Cleveland Public Library also became the first large urban library to institute an open-shelf policy. In addition, Brett developed programs and collections for children, instituted a classification system to group books of similar subject matter, opened Cleveland's first branch libraries, created library stations throughout the city, expanded the collection of fiction, and created the city’s first stand-alone children's room. This trailblazing librarian helped secure both the land and funding for the Cleveland Public Library's permanent home in the city's emerging civic district east of Public Square.

And what a home it is. Designed by the prominent architectural firm of Walker & Weeks, the five-story facility was completed in 1925 for about $5 million. It is one of six buildings conforming to the Group Plan, an ambitious 1903 city-planning scheme built around a massive three-segment public park (the Mall) northeast of Public Square. Like most of the Group Plan buildings, the library reflects a Beaux Arts, neoclassical design. Its interior was modeled in a Renaissance style, making ample use of Italian marble. Vaulted ceilings are adorned with paintings of mythological and historical figures, while grand staircases carved in Botticino marble and elaborately decorated passageways invite visitors to explore the library's various departments.

Library functions were sorely tested during the Great Depression, when restrictions on public taxation reduced funding to libraries. Salaries were reduced, staff was let go, and the acquisition of new materials dropped drastically, even as library usage increased by up to 20 percent. Fortunately, Franklin D. Roosevelt's Public Works programs included the Cleveland library: WPA employees made building repairs, cleaned, painted, and even copied musical scores. In the 1930s, the library also was a recipient of federally funded art. In addition to countless prints and paintings, three WPA murals adorn the main Library’s walls to this day. Six additional murals were painted for branch libraries.

The late 1990s were a busy and productive time for the Cleveland Library system. Massive renovations were made to the building. A second structure—named after former U.S. Congressman Louis Stokes—was built in 1997 on the former site of the Cleveland Plain Dealer which, since 1957 had been used by the library as an annex. Focused largely on science and technology, the Stokes Wing has 11 floors totaling 267,000 square feet and more than 30 miles of book shelves for a capacity of 1.3 million books.

The two buildings are connected by an underground corridor below the outdoor Eastman Reading Garden, named after Linda Anne Eastman (1867–1963), the first woman to head a major U.S. city library system and a pioneer in the modern library system. The garden that bears her name was designed by landscape architecture firm OLIN, and includes sculptures by Maya Lin and Tom Otterness. The garden provides space for concerts, garden shows, book displays, and public art exhibits. Think of it as the center of a cultural sandwich—part of a block-long demonstration of Cleveland’s prowess and historic leadership in the arts and humanities.

Today, the Cleveland Public Library operates 27 branches throughout the city, a mobile library, a Public Administration Library in City Hall, and the Ohio Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped. Among the main facility’s special collections are the Mears and Murdock baseball collections, the Cleveland Theater collection, 130,000 volumes of children's material, a 74,000-volume rare book collection, 1.3 million photographs, and the John G. White Chess Collection—believed to be the largest and most comprehensive chess library in the world. In 2009, CPL became the first library in the United States to offer e-book downloads.

For more (including 15 images & 1 video) view the original article

The Group Plan of Public Buildings in 1903 was an ambitious city-planning scheme that—as much as any single initiative—shaped downtown Cleveland. The Plan’s six public buildings are the Federal Building (1910, now the Howard Metzenbaum US Courthouse), the Cuyahoga County Courthouse (1911), City Hall (1916), Public Auditorium (1922), the Cleveland Public Library (1926) and the Board of Education Building (1930). A seventh Group Plan structure—the Cuyahoga County Administration Building (1957)—was demolished in 2014 to make way for a Hilton Hotel.

All six structures are loosely clustered around the key Group Plan component, the Mall, a long, three-segment public park northeast of Public Square. The buildings are of uniform height and style, representing the Roman classicism of the Beaux-Arts school of architecture. The strategy was to create an official gateway, an iconic corridor, leading from a new railroad depot on the lakefront to Public Square.

Responding to proposals made by the American Institute of Architects and the Cleveland Chamber of Commerce, the City of Cleveland formed the Group Plan Commission in 1902. Three architects—Arnold W. Brunner, John M. Carrére and Daniel Burnham—served on the commission, which presented its recommendations to Mayor Tom L. Johnson in 1903. The resulting Group Plan was heavily influenced by several sources: One was the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Another was the Washington, D.C., Mall then under construction. A third was the City Beautiful movement: a response to concerns that the attractiveness and dignity of American cities were being compromised by poverty, over-population and the perceived deleterious effects of immigration. It was believed that “beautification”—personified by ample park space and grand, dignified buildings—would instill civic and moral virtue in city residents and revitalize urban areas that were increasingly perceived by the wealthy as undesirable places to live and work.

The central aim of the Group Plan was to re-center downtown and provide a model that might inspire harmonious architecture guided by principles other than the dominant commercial mode of urban development. However, the rail station idea, which was essential to such a re-centering, was scrapped because the U.S. Railroad Administration worried that local rail traffic would impede cross-country traffic on the "Water Level Route" along the lakefront, a matter of heightened importance during mobilization for World War I. The federal government looked with favor on a southern railroad approach to downtown by local and regional trains. The Van Sweringen plan for the Cleveland Union Terminal, which opened in 1930, meshed with this broader consideration and shifted the city's focus shifted from the Mall back to its traditional center on Public Square.

Despite the Mall's diminished role, it remains nothing less than “beautiful”—a testament to smart planning and placement, and the enduring aesthetic appeal of classical architecture. The Mall was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.

For more (including 7 images & 1 video) view the original article