Los Angeles Central Library | |
 South entrance at Hope Street | |
  Location in United States Show map of the United States | |
| Location | 630 W. 5th St.,Los Angeles, California |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 34°03′01″N118°15′18″W / 34.05028°N 118.25500°W /34.05028; -118.25500 (Los Angeles Central Library) |
| Area | less than 1-acre (0.40 ha) |
| Built | 1925 (1925) |
| Architect | Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue |
| Architectural style | Art Deco, Mexican Late Baroque |
| NRHP reference No. | 70000136[1] |
| LAHCM No. | 46 |
| Significant dates | |
| Added to NRHP | December 18, 1970 |
| Designated LAHCM | March 1, 1967[2] |
Richard J. Riordan Central Library, primarily known as theLos Angeles Central Library, is the main branch of theLos Angeles Public Library (LAPL), inDowntown Los Angeles. It is named afterMayor of Los AngelesRichard Riordan.
It consists of two buildings: the Goodhue Building and theTom Bradley addition, from 1926 and 1993, respectively.[3] The former was listed on theNational Register of Historic Places (NRHP) on December 18, 1970.[4]
| External videos | |
|---|---|
 "Los Angeles Public Library Tour", April 27, 1999,C-SPAN |
The historic Central Library Goodhue building was constructed in 1926 and is aDowntown Los Angeles landmark.[5] The Central Library was designed by the architectBertram Goodhue.[6] The Richard J. Riordan Central Library complex is the third largest public library in the United States in terms of book and periodical holdings. Originally named the Central Library, the building was first renamed in honor of the longtime president of the Board of Library Commissioners and President of theUniversity of Southern California,Rufus B. von KleinSmid. The new wing of the Central Library, completed in 1993, was named in honor of former mayorTom Bradley.[7]
An expansion/renovation was proposed from circa 1966, but the library system did not enact them until 1986. From 1988 through 1993, the Central Library was extensively renovated and expanded in aModernist/Beaux-Arts style, according to Norman Pfeiffer ofHardy Holzman Pfeiffer Associates, the principal architect of the renovation.
The building's limited access had caused a number of problems. Generally, the accessible public stacks in the reading rooms only displayed about 10 to 20 percent of the actual collections of the Central Library. For anything else, a patron had to submit a request slip and a clerk would retrieve the desired material from the internal stacks. The internal stacks, contained in two concrete structures joined by a catwalk, were packed very tightly and had very little headroom. For example, while the normal reading rooms had ceilings of anywhere from 10 to 15 feet (3.0 to 4.6 m), the internal stack areas were many shelves of about six-foot (1.8 m) height, stacked internally, so that while the public access area was about two floors plus the Science and Technology alcove, the internal stacks were approximately five or six floors. To fix this would have required substantial renovation, a cost the city was not willing to cover, especially after hours of operation were cut in response to the 1978 property tax reduction measureProposition 13.
The library experienced two fires in 1986, one on April 29 and one on September 3, both due toarson. The April 29 arson fire “destroyed 20 percent of the central library collection and suspended service on the 5th Street building…The catastrophes came amid prolonged public debate concerning the future of the Goodhue building, which for years had been cited for major fire and safety hazards.”[8] This fire was the catalyst for the renovation.[9] Although the building was safely evacuated, its vintage construction precluded the ventilation of heat and smoke, and limitedfirefighter access. It took firefighters over seven hours to extinguish the fire and little fires continued to sprout for several days.[10] Some 400,000 volumes—20 percent of the library's holdings—were destroyed, with significant water and smoke damage to 700,000 more.[9][11] The estimated cost for replacing the 400,000 works lost was over $14 million.[12]
A second fire, on September 3 of the same year, destroyed the contents of the music department reading room. After the second it remained closed until 1993, when its renovation opened.[13]
As part of the rehabilitation plan, LAPL sold itsair rights to developers, enabling the construction of the eponymousLibrary Tower across the street. Theskyscraper was subsequently renamed the First Interstate World Center and later the U.S. Bank Tower.[14] Additional funds were raised through corporate and personal contributions which flowed from the effort of the "Save the Books" campaign formed by Mayor Tom Bradley.[citation needed] Among the findings during the re-cataloguing of the library's collections was a Shakespeare Fourth Folio.
The campaign, co-chaired byLodwrick Cook, then CEO ofAtlantic Richfield Company (ARCO) had targeted a goal to raise $10 million through corporate and individual contributions ranging from schoolchildren's nickels and dimes to $50,000 contributions by Los Angeles businessmanMarvin Davis and MCA ChairmanLew Wasserman.William Eugene "Gene" Scott, an LAPL neighbor and member of the 43 strong blue ribbon committee, donated the use of his University Network television studios and himself to what became a 48-hour telethon to raise $2 million towards the total objective.
The Library's renovation was completed in 1993. It included a large new underground parking facility, with a park designed byLawrence Halprin over it. The Central Library reopened on October 3, 1993.[13] The original Goodhue building and the Bradley wing was subsequently renamed in 2001 for former Los Angeles MayorRichard Riordan, as the Richard Riordan Central Library. Michael Finnegan of theLos Angeles Times wrote that initially there was some "political uproar" but as the renaming came it "was all but forgotten".[15]
Goodhue designed the original Los Angeles Central Library with influences ofancient Egyptian andMediterranean Revival architecture. The central tower is topped with a tiledmosaicpyramid with suns on the sides with a hand holding a torch representing the "Light of Learning" at the apex. Other elements includesphinxes,snakes, and celestial mosaics. It has sculptural elements by the preeminent American architectural sculptorLee Lawrie, similar to theNebraska State Capitol inLincoln, Nebraska, also designed by Goodhue. The interior of the library is decorated with various figures, statues, chandeliers, and grilles, notably a four-partmural by illustratorDean Cornwell depicting stages of theHistory of California which was completed around 1933.[16] The building is a designatedLos Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument, and is on theNational Register of Historic Places.
The 360,000-square-foot (33,000 m2) addition,[17] eight stories tall, had a cost of $213.9 million. The addition has about the same size as the original building. The project included a garage with 940 spaces, an atrium with a glass roof, an auditorium with capacity for 235 people, and apuppet theater. Amy Wallace of theLos Angeles Times wrote that "Where the old edifice was cramped, the new is expansive and imaginative".[18] Christopher Knight of theLos Angeles Times described the wing as "a major architectural disappointment" but that some of the pieces of art that were commissioned to be installed in the building "partially mitigates the fiasco."[17]
The expansion included an enormous, eight-story atrium wing dedicated to former mayor Tom Bradley. Now, the library contains an area of 538,000 square feet (50,000 m2), and has nearly 89 miles (143 km) of shelves and seating for over 1,400 people.[19]
TESSA (tessa.lapl.org[20]), named afterTessa Kelso,[21] is theLos Angeles Public Library website for online (photos and other digital) historical collections, that also includes scanned copies from these physical collections:
The Central Library houses and archives the extensive Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection of over 3 million historic photographs from varied sources and collection acquisitions. Many images can be viewed by the public via the online photo collection.[22] The physical Photo Collection is an important resource for researchers, writers, curators, and educators.[23]
The Photo Collection's sources have included: the formerLos Angeles Herald-Examinernewspaper photo morgue (2.2 million images); theSecurity Pacific Bank Collection (250,000); theLos Angeles Chamber of Commerce image archives (60,000), Hollywood Citizen News/Valley Times Newspaper Collection (30,000), and the 'Turn of the century Los Angeles' collection (150,000).
Collection sources also include the portfolios by noted local and regional photographers,[24] such as: the Ralph Morris Archives (25,000) of the Los Angeles area from 1939 to the late 1970s; a collection of 1940s L.A. images taken and donated byAnsel Adams,[25] and the William Reagh Collection[26] (40,000[27] with 800 online[26]) ofpost-war Los Angeles to 1991.[28]
The "Shades of L.A. Collection" is anarchive of more than 10,000 images donated/duplicated from family photo albums (collected by former Photo Collection director Carolyn Kozo Cole) that expanded the archives to include the many diverse ethnic histories of people in the city, beyond the already well represented 'Anglo' population.
The project's success expanded to theCalifornia State Library creating the "Shades of California" collection to represent the state's diverse communities, using the LAPL methods and model.[23] The book "Shades of California: The Hidden Beauty of Ordinary Life" resulted from the successful statewide project.[29] Over a dozen California city and county library districts also created local Shades of California collections, such asMonterey,Riverside, andHumboldt County.[30]
Located on Lower Level 2 of Central Library's Tom Bradley Wing, the Science, Technology & Patents Department's diverse collection covers agriculture, automobile repair, computers & computer science, cooking, construction (including building codes), consumer information, cosmetology, engineering, mathematics, medicine, nutrition, pets, psychiatry, UFOs, zoology, and more.[31]
In partnership with the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Science, Technology & Patents Department is a United States Patent & Trademark Resource Center,[32][33] offering resources to assist with patent and trademark research. The department holds a complete collection of allPatent and Trademark Office (PTO) publications including the complete Patent Gazette and Trademark Gazette issues from the opening of the PTO, and a complete set of registration books published by theUnited States Copyright Office starting from Volume 1. The patent collection also includesUnited Kingdom Old Law Patents 1617–1981 and United Kingdom New Law Applications 1979–1994.
In 2012Glen Creason, the map librarian for the central library, was invited to theMount Washington home of John Feathers, who had died at age 56 with no known relatives. According to Creason, the cottage contained approximately 100,000 maps and the library was delighted to accept their donation. "This dwarfs our collection," he said, "and we've been collecting for 100 years."The maps were stored on shelves, in boxes, in file cabinets, and even in the cabinet of an oldstereo system with its electronics removed.[34]
Creason said it could take a year tocatalog and organize the maps and 600 feet (180 m) of shelving would be needed, but the library would then have the fifth-largest map collection in the country.[34] The collection has been sorted and organized by volunteers C.J. Moon and Audrey Dalton.
Creason retired from the library in October 2021. As of August 2023,Peter Hauge has served as the Map Librarian overseeing the collection.[35][36]
cdm16703.contentdm.oclc.org (Powered byCONTENTdm®)
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Geographic | |
| Other | |
