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DPL History

On March 25, 1865, the Detroit Public Library formally opened to the reading public with a collection of 5,000 books in a room located in the old Capitol High School at State and Griswold. The library was created as a result of a special state law in 1842 requiring the Detroit Board of Education to establish a district library. However it wasn't until an 1861 ruling by the Michigan Supreme Court declaring that penal fines were to be credited to a library fund, that a way was found to establish and finance a public library.

By 1872 circulation exceeded 100,000 volumes per year and plans were made to construct a building for the public library. On May 29, 1875 the cornerstone was laid for the Centre Park Library located on the site of the present Skillman Branch. Five thousand people attended the dedication on January 22, 1877 of the three-story structure with a main reading room and gallery, or balcony, designed to hold 34,000 books. In 1878 a second galley was added, a third in 1882, and a fourth in 1887. But still more space was needed so additions were made in 1884 and 1895.

As Detroit's population tripled and its area increased, from 17 to 28 square mile, the need for a system of branch libraries became evident. In 1897, the Detroit Water Commission established the Hurlbut Library in Water Works Park to house the collection of former Water Commissioner Chauncy Hurlbut, and the Library Commission agreed to supply it with books for public circulation. This in effect was Detroit's first branch library. The operation and staffing of the Hurlbut Library was turned over to the Library Commission in 1905.

The first branch staffed and operated exclusively by the Library Commission opened on April 2, 1900 in Room 18 of Central High School (now Old Main, Wayne State University). The second and third branches opened the same year, in the Harris School on April 16, 1900 and in the newly completed Western High School on October 25.

The first branch library owned and built by the Library Commission was the Gray Branch on Field Avenue near E. Jefferson, which opened June 1, 1906. Construction of branch facilities was accelerated with a gift in 1910 from steel magnate Andrew Carnegie. During the 1920s and 30s ten branches were added and between 1940 and 1967 12 more were built. All were constructed with Library Commission funds. The Douglass Branch, built in 1971 and the Elmwood Park Branch which opened in a rented building in 1975 are the last branches to be added. In 1981, the Redford Branch moved from its original location to a new building.

Although Andrew Carnegie had offered to contribute $750,000 for a new central library and branches as early as 1901, due to a chain of events and much heated discussion by Detroiters, it was not accepted until 1910.

Detroiters realized that the Centre Park Library was too small to house its collection of 175,000 books. In 1912 a site for a new central or main library was acquired at Woodward and Kirby. The noted New York architect, Cass Gilbert was selected to design the new main library and construction began in January 1915.

Due to lack of funds, construction delays and World War I, the formal dedication of the Main Library did not take place until June 3, 1921. The early Italian Renaissance-style building of three floors housed eight reference departments and 439,000 books. In 1963 wings fronting Cass Avenue were added to the north and south ends of the original building.

For more history, take a look at Parnassus on Main Street: a History of the Detroit Public Library, by Arthur B. Woodford.