Seattle Public Library

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Central Library (looking south on Fifth Avenue).
Central Library (looking south on Fifth Avenue).
The public library in Henry Yesler's former home downtown at Third and James, burned January 2, 1901.
The public library in Henry Yesler's former home downtown at Third and James, burned January 2, 1901.

The Seattle Public Library is the public library system serving Seattle, Washington, USA. It was officially established by the city in 1890, though there had been a library association active in Seattle since 1868. There are 26 branches in the system: Ballard, Beacon Hill, Broadview, Capitol Hill, Columbia, Delridge, Douglass-Truth, Fremont, Green Lake, Greenwood, High Point, International District/Chinatown, Lake City, Madrona-Sally Goldmark, Magnolia, Montlake, North East, Northgate, NewHolly, Queen Anne, Rainier Beach, Southwest, South Park, University, Wallingford, and West Seattle. Also included are the new (2004) Central Library and the Washington Talking Book & Braille Library (WTBBL).

In 1998, Seattle voters, with an unprecedented 69 percent approval rate, approved the largest library bond issue then ever submitted in the United States. The $196 million "Libraries for All" bond measure, along with private funds raised by the Seattle Public Library Foundation, nearly doubled the square footage in Seattle's libraries, including the building of new branches and a new Central Library.

As of 2006, the Seattle Public Library system had 699 staff members (538 full-time equivalents). It circulated 3,151,840 adult books, 1,613,979 children's books, 570,316 WTBBL materials, and 3,895,444 other media (CDs, DVDs, videotapes, etc.) Staff members answered more than 1 million reference questions. [1] The system also provides 1,134 public computers.[2] Anyone with a library card can get up to one hour a day of free computer use; the system accepts reservations for a computer at a particular time at a particular branch.

The library has moved to an RFID system for materials, which allows people to check out their materials without assistance, freeing librarians to focus on matters other than circulation.[3]

Until 2004, the library was home to Nancy Pearl, one of the few celebrity librarians in the English-speaking world. Pearl's Book Lust book series and her much-imitated "If All Seattle Read the Same Book" project (now called "Seattle Reads") resulted in her being perhaps the only librarian who has ever been honored with an action figure.

Many of Seattle's early libraries were Carnegie libraries. Some of those buildings have been converted to other purposes (Ballard's former Carnegie library has held a number of restaurants, antique stores, etc.) but others (such as the Fremont Branch and Green Lake Branch) have been modernized, and remain in use.

[edit] Architecture

Many Library facilities are notable works of architecture. The Seattle Central Library opened in 2004 and was designed by Rem Koolhaas of OMA[4] in a joint venture with LMN Architects. In 2007, the building was voted #108 on the American Institute of Architects' (AIA) list of Americans' 150 favorite structures in the U.S. The building received a 2005 national AIA Honor Award for Architecture.[5]

Six current Seattle branch libraries are on the National Register of Historic Places: Columbia (architects: Harlan P. Thomas and W. Marbury Somervell), Fremont (architect: Daniel Riggs Huntington), Green Lake (architects: W. Marbury Somervell & Joseph S. Cote), Queen Anne (architects: Harlan P. Thomas and W. Marbury Somervell), University (architects: Somervell & Joseph S. Cote), and West Seattle (architects: W. Marbury Somervell & Joseph S. Cote).[6]

In addition, several buildings have been designated as landmarks by Seattle's Landmarks Preservation Board: Columbia,[7] Douglass-Truth,[8] Fremont, Green Lake, Lake City, Magnolia, North East, Queen Anne, University, and West Seattle.[7]

Mid-20th-century logo of the Seattle Public Library

One of the library's past logos

Fremont Branch (built 1921), originally a Carnegie library

Fremont Branch, exterior

Ballard's former Carnegie Library

Ballard Branch

Green Lake Branch

Reading Room in the Central Library

2006 wing of Douglass-Truth Branch, Central District

[edit] References

  1. ^ History factsheets - SPL website
  2. ^ 2006 Annual Report
  3. ^ 2006 Annual Report
  4. ^ Office for Metropolitan Architecture - official website
  5. ^ Seattle Public Library on AIA Archiblog.
  6. ^ WASHINGTON - King County (page 4), National Register of Historic Places online.
  7. ^ a b Key Contacts, Libraries for All Capital Projects, Seattle Public Library, 5 December 2007. Accessed online 28 December 2007.
  8. ^ Public invited to view designs for Douglass-Truth Library Expansion, press release, Seattle Public Library, 9 April 2002. Accessed online 28 December 2007.

[edit] External links

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