Carnegie Library of Homestead | |
---|---|
Location | 510 East 10th Ave Munhall, PA 15120-1910, United States |
Type | Public |
Established | November 5, 1898 |
Collection | |
Size | 34,000 |
Other information | |
Website | Library Website |
Designated | 1989 [1] |
The Carnegie Library of Homestead is a public library in Munhall, Pennsylvania founded by Andrew Carnegie in 1898.
It is one of 2,509 Carnegie libraries worldwide, 1,689 of which were built in the United States. It was the sixth library commissioned by Carnegie in the U.S. and the seventh to open. 1 Completed in November 1898, it is the third oldest Carnegie library in continuous operation in its original structure in the U.S. after the Main Branch and Lawrenceville Branch of Pittsburgh. 2 The library is an independent entity; it is not a "branch" of the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, which operates one main facility and 19 branches within the city of Pittsburgh.
The building houses a library with a collection of over 34,000, the 1,047-seat "Carnegie Library Music Hall" and an athletic club with a heated indoor pool.
The library was constructed on a hill in Mifflin Township, Pennsylvania (part of which became today's borough of Munhall), overlooking Homestead and the Homestead Steel Works. This was the site of an 1892 labor strike in which Pinkerton agents fought with union workers, resulting in 16 deaths.
A library had been under consideration for several years before the strike, but unlike those at Carnegie's Homestead plant, laborers at the Edgar Thomson Works in Braddock had capitulated to his wage concession demands in 1887, and the Carnegie Free Library of Braddock was founded the following year. "Our works at Homestead are not to us as our works at Edgar Thomson. Our men there are not partners", Carnegie said.
The $300,000 project was ground-broken in April 1896. Pittsburgh architects Frank Alden and Alfred Harlow designed the French Renaissance facility, which was 220 by 132 feet. Contractor William Miller and Sons used Pompeian brick.
Renovations and modifications have not altered the original physical arrangement of the building, which comprises three separate facilities — a library, music hall, and athletic club — under one roof. [2]
While Carnegie required communities to use public funds to subsidize the operation of his libraries, Homestead was one of the few exceptions. Operation of the libraries in Braddock, Homestead, and Duquesne were initially funded by Carnegie's plants in those towns. After selling his business to U.S. Steel in 1901, Carnegie established a $1 million trust to support the three facilities. In the 1960s, the Braddock and Duquesne libraries were turned over to the school districts in those communities by the Board of the Endowment for the Monongahela Valley. The Homestead Library is now the sole beneficiary of Carnegie's gift.
USX Corporation, the successor to U.S. Steel, continued to provide major support until 1988, when the corporation terminated its regular donations and the Borough of Munhall assumed responsibility for the library. Despite the closing of the Homestead Steel Works two years earlier and the precipitous decline in employment and tax revenue, the library remained open and operational with grants secured by community volunteers and the investment income from Carnegie's endowment. When the financial crash of 2008 reduced the endowment's value by $300,000, the library board furloughed its executive employees and assumed management responsibilities rather than cut services. Fundraising efforts, revenue from athletic club memberships, music hall rentals, and concession sales have maintained the library's viability. [3]
In 2017, the library launched a 10-year capital renovation campaign to restore areas in the building, preserving its historical features with modernized amenities. New locker rooms and classrooms were added to the lower level; an elevator was installed in the music hall and a welcome center in the gymnasium. The next phase is renovating the library and meeting rooms and starting the seat replacement project in the music hall. [4]
In the early 20th century, the Homestead Library & Athletic Club football team, composed of many former star Ivy League players, was considered one of the top semi-professional teams in the country. Hall of Famer Rube Waddell played for the club's baseball team. The amateur teams at the library also won national championships in wrestling and track & field. [5]
In the 1920s and 1930s, four Olympians trained in the library's swimming pool. [6] Susan Laird swam in 1928, winning a gold medal with the 4 × 100 meter freestyle relay team; Josephine McKim won a bronze medal in 1928 and gold in 1932; Anna Mae Gorman competed in the 1932 Summer Olympics at age 16; and Lenore Kight won silver in 1932 and a bronze in 1936. Gorman first swam in 1927 while on vacation. When she returned to Homestead, she purchased a three-month membership at the library and pool for $1. At age 92 in 2008, Gorman still swam at the library. [7] [8]
The building has rightfully in the center as the focus 'The Library'-- Music Hall upon the right and the Working Man's Club upon the left. These three foundations from which healing waters are to flow for the Instruction, Entertainment and Happiness of the people. Recreation of the working man has an important bearing upon his character and development as his hours of work.
—Andrew Carnegie on the Homestead Library
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Braddock is a borough located in the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States, 10 miles (16 km) upstream from the mouth of the Monongahela River. The population was 1,721 as of the 2020 census, a 91.8% decline since its peak of 20,879 in 1920.
Homestead is a borough in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States, along the Monongahela River 7 miles (11 km) southeast of downtown Pittsburgh. The borough is known for the Homestead strike of 1892, an important event in the history of labor relations in the United States. The population was 2,884 at the 2020 census. It is part of the Pittsburgh metropolitan area.
Munhall is a borough in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States, on the west bank of the Monongahela River. The population was 10,774 at the 2020 census. It is a residential suburb of the Pittsburgh metropolitan area.
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A Carnegie library is a library built with money donated by Scottish-American businessman and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. A total of 2,509 Carnegie libraries were built between 1883 and 1929, including some belonging to public and university library systems. 1,689 were built in the United States, 660 in the United Kingdom and Ireland, 125 in Canada, and 25 others in Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, Serbia, Belgium, France, the Caribbean, Mauritius, Malaysia, and Fiji.
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Carnegie Steel Company was a steel-producing company primarily created by Andrew Carnegie and several close associates to manage businesses at steel mills in the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area in the late 19th century. The company was formed in 1892, and was subsequently sold in 1901 in one of the largest business transactions of the early 20th century, to become a major component of U.S. Steel. The sale made Carnegie one of the richest men in history.
Homestead Steel Works was a large steel works located on the Monongahela River at Homestead, Pennsylvania in the United States. The company developed in the nineteenth century as an extensive plant served by tributary coal and iron fields, a railway 425 miles (684 km) long, and a line of lake steamships. The works was also the site of one of the more serious labor disputes in U.S. history, which became known as the Homestead strike of 1892.
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Union Railroad is a Class III switching railroad located in Allegheny County in Western Pennsylvania. The company is owned by Transtar, Inc., which is a subsidiary of Fortress Transportation and Infrastructure Investors, after being acquired from U.S. Steel in 2021. The railroad's primary customers are the three plants of the USS Mon Valley Works, the USS Edgar Thomson Steel Works, the USS Irvin Plant and the USS Clairton Coke Works.
The Edgar Thomson Steel Works is a steel mill in the Pittsburgh area communities of Braddock and North Braddock, Pennsylvania. It has been active since 1875. It is currently owned by U.S. Steel and is known as Mon Valley Works – Edgar Thomson Plant.
Carrie Furnace is a former blast furnace located along the Monongahela River in the Pittsburgh area industrial town of Swissvale, Pennsylvania, and it had formed a part of the Homestead Steel Works. The Carrie Furnaces were built in 1884 and they operated until 1982. During its peak, the site produced 1,000 to 1,250 tons of iron per day. All that is left of the site are furnaces #6 and #7, which operated from 1907 to 1978, and its hot metal bridge. The furnaces, designated a National Historic Landmark in 2006, are among the only pre-World War II 20th century blast furnaces to survive.
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Lenore M. Kight, known by her married name Lenore Wingard after 1935, was an American competition swimmer for the Carnegie Library Athletic fund and an Olympic medalist in the 400 meter freestyle who represented the United States at the 1932 Los Angeles and 1936 Berlin Summer Olympics.
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John Arthur Hall was an American football player and coach. He played college football for the Yale Bulldogs football team and was selected as a consensus honoree on the 1897 College Football All-America Team. He also served as the head coach of the Carlisle Indians football team in 1898. Hall also played ice hockey on intercollegiate and amateur levels for Yale University and teams in New York City and Pittsburgh.