Ask Margaret
What you heard is true times three. The
Tampa Bay area actually is fortunate enough
to have three Carnegie libraries that are still
intact, one in West Tampa, one in Tampa
Heights and another in St. Petersburg. They
are the only remaining examples of the 10
original Carnegie libraries that were built
with grants given between 1901 and 1917
in the state of Florida that remain standing
and are still used as libraries or for library
business.
Andrew Carnegie, a Scottish-American
steel magnate and philanthropist, who
recognized the need for libraries, awarded
grants through his Carnegie Corporation
of New York to possibly as many as
3,000 towns and cities throughout
the United States, Canada and
Europe. Carnegie’s libraries were
constructed in various styles and
sizes. Each one was reportedly
required to contain the complete
works, plus a portrait bust of
Scottish poet Robert Burns (1759-
1796). That Carnegie’s wishes were
completely carried out is unlikely,
especially since any Burns busts that may have existed, at least
in the Tampa Bay area, seem to have disappeared.
Carnegie’s first library in the Tampa Bay area came about
after Tampa resident Hugh Campbell MacFarlane met Carnegie
on a steamship bound for Scotland. The West Tampa Branch
Library at 1718 N. Howard Ave, now a City of Tampa historic
structure, was built in 1913 on land donated by cigar factory
owner Angel Cuesta in what was then the small town of West
Tampa. The library, temporarily the location of city offices, still
serves the surrounding community. It underwent a yearlong
expansion of 5,000 square feet that was completed in 2003, and
was followed by renovations finished the following year.
Carnegie’s next Tampa Bay area library was the St.
Petersburg Public Library, also known as
the Mirror Lake Community Library, or
appropriately, the Carnegie Library. The
St. Petersburg Reading Room Association,
which began to raise funds for a library
in 1906, sought $40,000 from the Carnegie
Foundation in order to fund the library.
However, based on the city’s population,
the group was offered $14,500, until the
Carnegie Foundation was informed
about the area’s large tourist season. This
Someone told me that there is a
historic Carnegie Library in the Tampa
Bay area. If this is true, where is it, and
what can you tell me about it?
134 TAMPA BAY MAGAZINE | MAY/JUNE 2021
by Margaret Word Burnside
increase justified a $17,500 grant that the
city agreed to match. In 1914, a site on the
banks of the city reservoir (now Mirror
Lake) was selected for the library.
Renowned New York architect Henry
Whitfield, who was Andrew Carnegie’s
brother-in-law, worked for the Carnegie
Corporation and designed many other
Carnegie libraries. Whitfield’s Beaux-Arts
design featured sculptural decoration,
conservative modern lines and slightly
overscaled details, such as deep cornices
and swags. In 1986, the Mirror Lake
Community Library in St. Petersburg
was added to the U.S. National Register
of Historic Places. In 1987, the
city of St. Petersburg approved
a plan to restore the library by
removing a wing added in 1951,
and to repair the building so
that it could continue to be used
as a library. After unexpected
construction delays, the library
reopened in 1994. By 1997, it
was officially complete with an
additional 8,000 square feet that
was designed to blend harmoniously with its historic exterior.
Our third Carnegie library, the Old Tampa Free Public Library,
or Free Library at 102 E. Seventh Ave. in the Tampa Heights
area of Tampa, was made possible by a $50,000 grant from the
Carnegie Corporation. The T-plan masonry, brown and yellow
brick over granite basement library with a barrel tile roof,
was designed by Tampa architect Fred James and constructed
between 1915 and 1917. The library’s interior featured a
dumbwaiter, a children’s area, back files of newspapers and
magazines and Tampa’s first bookmobile.
The Free Library served as Tampa’s main library until
1968, when insufficient space for parking, visitors and an
ever expanding collection of books and other materials
necessitated a move to the new John
F. Germany Public Library located
downtown. The Free Library was added
to the U.S. National Registry of Historic
Places in 1991, and refurbished in 1999.
Since 2016, it has housed the Tampa and
Hillsborough County Public Library
system’s administrative offices and the
Tampa-Hillsborough County Public
Library system’s Hillsborough Literacy
Council.
K.D., Sarasota
If you have any questions about the
people, places or things in the Tampa
Bay area, please send them to
“Ask Margaret” at Tampa Bay Magazine,
2531 Landmark Drive, Suite 101,
Clearwater, Florida 33761.
We regret that not all questions
can be answered.
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