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Takoma Park Neighborhood Library

Introduction

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The Takoma Park Neighborhood Library was the first branch library of the DC Public Library system, and one of a small handful of libraries built with funding from American Philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. It opened on November 17, 1911, with 40,000 dollars in funding from Carnegie. It replaced a prior private subscription service library which had been located adjacent to the Takoma Park B&O railroad station. The building is a one-story Renaissance Revival brick structure, designed by architectural firm Marsh and Peter. The library is in the Takoma Park Historic District, which was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983, and received a major renovation in 2009.

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The Takoma Park Library was opened in 1911.

Plant, Building, Window, Sky

The library was designed by the architectural firm Marsh and Peter.

Property, Building, Window, Wood

Backstory and Context

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Andrew Carnegie was a Scottish immigrant, who through the 1880s amassed a fortune through building a monopoly in steal, US Steel. When Carnegie sold US Steel to JP Morgan in 1901, he made almost half a billion dollars. Carnegie gave away much of that money for funding over 1600 libraries nicknamed "Carnegie Libraries" built first in Scotland and Pittsburgh, then all across the world.

Carnegie's first library in Washington, D.C. opened in 1903, and served as the flagship library for the DC Library into the 1970s. During the opening ceremony for the Carnegie library, Carnegie announced an additional 350,000 dollars in funding to "build Neighborhood Library buildings from time to time as the trustees may call upon me to do so." A bill passed the Senate in 1906 to secure authorization from Congress, and Takoma Park was chosen due to its long distance from the main library, the proximity of large public schools, and proof it could sustain its own library (the private subscription library).

The branch opened in 1911 with 3,800 volumes either purchased or transferred from the main library.

Sources

Takoma Park Library History, DC Public Library. Accessed April 16th 2021. https://www.dclibrary.org/node/738.

Stanberg, Susan. How Andrew Carnegie Turned His Fortune Into A Library Legacy, NPR. August 1st 2013. Accessed April 16th 2021. https://www.npr.org/2013/08/01/207272849/how-andrew-carnegie-turned-his-fortune-into-a-library-legacy.

Additional Information