Petaluma's Carnegie Grant

While the library, under the city's management, benefited from the increased funding tax-support provided, seeing consistent growth in its collection and improvements derived from the oversight of a full-time, salaried librarian, it continued to suffer from the lack of a permanent space to house its collection. In the ten years following its transfer to the city, the library was moved four times: in the Whitney Building, in rented rooms above the Wickersham Bank, on an upper floor of the Poehlman Building and then finally in 1887 to the third floor of the newly completed City Hall (Kortum, 1988).

Petaluma City Hall, 1887
Courtesy of Sonoma County Library

In 1896, the Ladies Home Improvement Club sent in the first application for a Carnegie grant to aid the city in securing in the funds necessary to construct a dedicated library building. They received no response. The Library Trustees sent in a second request for $20,000 in 1900, to which they received an offer of $12,500, conditional upon the securing of an appropriate building site and the enactment of an ordinance that would guarantee the library an annual support equal to 10% of the Carnegie grant or $1250.

Mrs. Addie Atwater, a prominent citizen, President of the aforementioned Ladies Home Improvement Club and widow to one of the early library trustees, generously offered the board an ideally situated site at half its market value. The site was purchased by the city for $2,500 upon the condition that the land be used in perpetuity solely for the purposes of a free public library. Should the land cease to be used for a free public library, it and all improvements would revert back to the original owner or her heirs.

Having secured the building site, the city council unanimously passed an ordinance on December 2, 1901 to levy an annual tax to raise at least $1600 dollars each fiscal year for the library's maintenance. This tax was higher than the minimum specified by the Carnegie grant, and the trustees used this fact to request an increase in the grant amount to $16,000, which was denied.

The city then began searching for a $12,500 building design and accepted that of Brainerd Jones, a local architect. Unfortunately, when they put the design to bid, the lowest bid they were able to find was for $15,447. The city was able to make up this difference through donations and public fundraising.

The cornerstone for the building was at last laid on June 10, 1904 to great fanfare. Festivities were held throughout the day in celebration. "Hundreds of distinguished visitors from many parts of the State of California" (Carnegie Library Cornerstone Laid, 1904) were in attendance and after the ceremonies were complete, the city cleared the streets for a parade, "one of the largest ever seen in the city," in which local Masons and Knights Templar from Petaluma and beyond, in addition to every fraternal order and civic organization participated (Carnegie Library Cornerstone Laid, 1904). A special train from Santa Rosa brought in "Knights, Masons, and their ladies and citizens in general" and was scheduled to leave "at midnight and not until then [would] the festivities cease" (Carnegie Library Cornerstone Laid, 1904). This elaborate celebration and the excitement it stirred are a testament to the importance of the library to the people of Petaluma and the civic pride they derived from the construction of their own library.  



Corner Stone Laying Celebration, Petaluma, June, 1904
Courtesy of Sonoma County Library

The new Petaluma Free Library opened its doors on November 13, 1906, fortuitously, not long after damages from the great 1906 earthquake had forced the library to shut down its City Hall location.