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New York Public Library Main Branch

March 24, 2023

The Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, commonly known as the Main Branch, 42nd Street Library or the New York Public Library,[b] is the flagship building in the New York Public Library system in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City. The branch, one of four research libraries in the library system, contains nine separate divisions. The structure contains four stories open to the public. The main entrance steps are at Fifth Avenue at its intersection with East 41st Street. As of 2015, the branch contains an estimated 2.5 million volumes in its stacks.[a] The building was declared a National Historic Landmark, a National Register of Historic Places site, and a New York City designated landmark in the 1960s.

Stephen A. Schwarzman Building
Main Branch
Main entrance on 5th Avenue
CountryUnited States
TypeResearch library
EstablishedMay 23, 1911 (1911-05-23) (opened to public)
ArchitectCarrère and Hastings
Location476 Fifth Avenue, Manhattan, New York City, 10018
Branch ofNew York Public Library
Collection
Items collectedApproximately 2.5 million (2015)[a]
Websitewww.nypl.org/locations/schwarzman
Coordinates40°45′11″N 73°58′55″W / 40.75306°N 73.98194°W / 40.75306; -73.98194Coordinates: 40°45′11″N 73°58′55″W / 40.75306°N 73.98194°W / 40.75306; -73.98194
Built1897–1911
Architectural style(s)Beaux-Arts
DesignatedDecember 21, 1965[1]
Reference no.66000546
DesignatedOctober 15, 1966[2]
Reference no.66000546
DesignatedJanuary 11, 1967
Reference no.0246
Designated entityFacade[3]
DesignatedNovember 12, 1974
Reference no.0880
Designated entityInterior: Astor Hall, Stairs, and McGraw Rotunda[4]
DesignatedAugust 8, 2017
Reference no.2592
Designated entityInterior: Rose Main Reading Room and Public Catalog Room[5]

The Main Branch was built after the New York Public Library was formed as a combination of two libraries in the late 1890s. The site, along Fifth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Streets, is located directly east of Bryant Park, on the site of the Croton Reservoir. The architectural firm Carrère and Hastings constructed the structure in the Beaux-Arts style, and the structure opened on May 23, 1911. The marble facade of the building contains ornate detailing, and the Fifth Avenue entrance is flanked by a pair of stone lions that serve as the library's icon. The interior of the building contains the Main Reading Room, a space measuring 78 by 297 feet (24 by 91 m) with a 52-foot-high (16 m) ceiling; a Public Catalog Room; and various reading rooms, offices, and art exhibitions.

The Main Branch became popular after its opening and saw 4 million annual visitors by the 1920s. It formerly contained a circulating library, though the circulating division of the Main Branch moved to the nearby Mid-Manhattan Library in 1970. Additional space for the library's stacks was constructed under adjacent Bryant Park in 1991, and the branch's Main Reading Room was restored in 1998. A major restoration from 2007 to 2011 was underwritten by a $100 million gift from philanthropist Stephen A. Schwarzman, for whom the branch was subsequently renamed. The branch underwent another expansion starting in 2018. The Main Branch has been featured in many television shows and films.

History

 
A remnant of the Croton distribution reservoir, seen at the foundation of the South Court in 2014

The consolidation of the Astor and Lenox Libraries into the New York Public Library in 1895,[9][10] along with a large bequest from Samuel J. Tilden and a donation of $5.2 million from Andrew Carnegie,[11] allowed for the creation of an enormous library system.[12] The libraries had a combined 350,000 items after the merger, which was relatively small compared to other library systems at the time.[13][14] As a point of civic pride, the New York Public Library's founders wanted an imposing main branch.[9][15] While the American Museum of Natural History and the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Fifth Avenue branch were both located on prominent sites facing Central Park, there was no such site available for a main library building; furthermore, most of the city's libraries were either private collections or small branch libraries.[16]

Development

Site and design selection

Several sites were considered, including those of the Astor and Lenox Libraries.[17] In March 1896, the trustees of the libraries ultimately chose a new site along Fifth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Streets, because it was centrally located between the Astor and Lenox Libraries.[13][18][19] At the time, it was occupied by the obsolete Croton Reservoir,[13][19] remnants of which still exist on the library floor.[20] The library's trustees convinced mayor William L. Strong to give them the reservoir site, after they gave him studies showing that the size of New York City's library collection lagged behind those of many other cities.[21] Dr. John Shaw Billings, who was named the first director of the New York Public Library, had created an early sketch for a massive reading room on top of seven floors of book-stacks, combined with the fastest system for getting books into the hands of those who requested to read them.[22][23] His design for the new library, though controversial for its time,[24] formed the basis of the Main Branch.[22][23] Once the Main Branch was opened, the Astor and Lenox Libraries were planned to close, and their functions were planned to be merged into that of the Main Branch.[13]

In May 1897, the New York State Legislature passed a bill allowing the site of the Croton Reservoir to be used for a public library building.[13][25] The Society of Beaux-Arts Architects hosted an architectural design competition for the library, with two rounds. The rules of the competition's first round were never published, but they were used as the basis for later design competitions.[26] Entrants submitted 88 designs,[27][28] of which 12 were selected for a semi-finalist round and six went on to a finalist round.[29][28] About a third of the designs, 29 in total, followed the same design principles outlined in Billings's original sketch. Each of the semifinalist designs were required to include specific architectural features, including limestone walls; a central delivery desk; reading rooms with large windows; and stacks illuminated by sunlight.[28] The six finalists were selected by a jury composed of library trustees and architects. The jury relaxed the requirement that the proposals adhere to a specific floor plan after McKim, Mead & White, which had received the most votes from the jury, nearly withdrew from the competition.[30] All of the finalist designs were in the Beaux-Arts style.[28]

Ultimately, in November 1897, the relatively unknown firm of Carrère and Hastings was selected to design and construct the new library.[31][32] The jury named the firm of Howard & Cauldwell and McKim, Mead, & White as runners-up.[32] Carrère and Hastings created a model for the future library building, which was exhibited at New York City Hall in 1900.[33][34] Whether John Mervin Carrère or Thomas S. Hastings contributed more to the design is in dispute, but both architects are honored with busts located at the bottoms of each of Astor Hall's two staircases.[22] In a later interview with The New York Times, Carrère stated that the library would contain "twenty-five or thirty different rooms", each with their own specialty; "eighty-three miles of books" in its stacks; and a general reading room that could fit a thousand guests.[35] During the design process, Hastings had wanted to shift the library building closer to Sixth Avenue, and he also proposed sinking 42nd Street to create a forecourt for the library, but both plans were rejected.[36] The New York City Board of Estimate approved Carrère and Hastings's plans for the library in December 1897.[37][38]

Construction

Construction was delayed by the objections of mayor Robert Anderson Van Wyck, who expressed concerns that the city's finances were unstable.[25][39] As a result, the planned library was delayed for a year.[39] The Board of Estimate authorized a bond measure of $500,000 in May 1899.[13] The next month, contractor Eugene Lentilhon started excavating the Croton Reservoir,[39][40] and workers began digging through the reservoir's 25-foot-thick (7.6 m) wall.[13] After spending seven weeks tunneling through the wall, Lentilhon determined that the floor of the reservoir could only be demolished using dynamite.[39] Work on the foundation commenced in May 1900,[12][41] and much of the Croton Reservoir had been excavated by 1901.[13][39] In November 1900, work was hindered by a water main break that partly flooded the old reservoir.[42] Norcross Brothers received the general contract,[41][34] although this was initially controversial because the firm was not the lowest bidder.[43] After a private ceremony to mark the start of construction was held in August 1902,[41] a ceremonial cornerstone was laid on November 10, 1902.[44][39][45] The cornerstone contained a box of artifacts from the library and the city.[46] The architects awarded the contract for the library's stacks to Snead & Company; for drainage and plumbing to M. J. O'Brien; for interior finishes to the John Peirce Company; and for electric equipment to the Lord Electric Company.[34]

 
Progress on the marble work, c. 1903
 
Front elevation in 1908; the lion statues at the Main Branch had not yet been installed.

Work progressed gradually on the library: the basement was completed by 1903, and the first floor by 1904.[41] However, exterior work was delayed due to the high cost of securing large amounts of marble, as well as frequent labor strikes.[34] When the Norcross Brothers' contract expired in August 1904, the exterior was only halfway completed.[47] During mid-1905, giant columns were put into place and work on the roof was begun; the roof was finished by December 1906.[12] The remaining contracts, totaling $1.2 million, concerned the installation of furnishings in the interior.[48] The interior and exterior were largely constructed simultaneously.[34] The building's exterior was mostly done by the end of 1907.[41][34] The pace of construction was generally sluggish; in 1906, an official for the New York Public Library stated that some of the exterior and most of the interior was not finished.[49]

Contractors started painting the main reading room and catalog room in 1908, and began installing furniture the following year.[41] Starting in 1910, around 75 miles (121 km) worth of shelves were installed to hold the collections that were designated for being housed there, with substantial room left for future acquisitions.[50] It took one year to transfer and install the books from the Astor and Lenox Libraries.[51] Late in the construction process, a proposal to install a municipal light plant in the basement of the Main Branch was rejected.[52] By late 1910, the library was nearly completed,[53] and officials forecast an opening date of May 1911.[54] Carrère died before the building was opened, and in March 1911, two thousand people viewed his coffin in the library's rotunda.[55]

Opening

On May 23, 1911, officials held a ceremony to open the main branch of the New York Public Library. U.S. president William Howard Taft presided over the ceremony, whose 15,000 guests included governor John Alden Dix and mayor William Jay Gaynor.[56][57][58] The public was invited the following day, May 24,[59][60] and tens of thousands went to the Library's "jewel in the crown".[50] The first item called for was Philosophy of the Plays of Shakespeare Unfolded by Delia Bacon, although this was a publicity stunt, and the book was not in the Main Branch's collection at the time.[46][61] The first item actually delivered was N. I. Grot's Nravstvennye idealy nashego vremeni ("Ethical Ideas of Our Time"), a study of Friedrich Nietzsche and Leo Tolstoy. The reader filed his slip at 9:08 a.m. and received his book seven minutes later.[46][62]

The Beaux-Arts Main Branch was the largest marble structure up to that time in the United States,[50] with shelf space for 3.5 million volumes spread across 375,000 square feet (34,800 m2).[57] The projected final cost was $10 million, excluding the cost of the books and the land, representing a fourfold increase over the initial cost estimate of $2.5 million.[57][63] The structure ultimately cost $9 million to build,[64][56] over three times as much as originally projected.[62][65] Because there were so many visitors during the first week of the Main Branch's opening, the New York Public Library's directors initially did not count the number of visitors, but guessed that 250,000 patrons were accommodated during the first week.[66] The construction of the Main Branch, along with that of the nearby Grand Central Terminal, helped to revitalize Bryant Park.[41]

20th-century growth

The Main Branch came to be regarded as an architectural landmark. As early as 1911, Harper's Monthly magazine praised the architecture of "this interesting and important building".[44] In 1971, New York Times architectural critic Ada Louise Huxtable wrote, "As urban planning, the library still suits the city remarkably well" and praised its "gentle monumentality and knowing humanism".[67] Architectural historian Kate Lemos wrote in 2006 that the library "has held a commanding presence at the bustling corner of 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue as the neighborhood grew up around it".[59]

The Main Branch also took on importance as a major research center.[46][68] Norbert Pearlroth, who served as a researcher for the Ripley's Believe It or Not! book series, perused an estimated 7,000 books annually from 1923 to 1975.[68] Other patrons included First Lady of the United States Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis; writers Alfred Kazin, Norman Mailer, Frank McCourt, John Updike, Cecil Beaton, Isaac Bashevis Singer, and E. L. Doctorow; actors Helen Hayes, Marlene Dietrich, Lillian Gish, Diana Rigg, and Princess Grace Kelly of Monaco; playwright Somerset Maugham; film producer Francis Ford Coppola; journalists Eliezer Ben-Yehuda and Tom Wolfe; and boxer Joe Frazier.[46] The Main Branch was also used for major works and invention. Edwin Land conducted research at the building for his later invention, the Land Camera, while Chester Carlson invented Xerox photocopiers after researching photoconductivity and electrostatics at the library.[46][68] During World War II, American soldiers decoded a Japanese cipher based on a Mexican phone book whose last remaining copy among Allied nations existed at the Main Branch.[68]

1920s and 1930s

 
Back elevation, 1910s

Initially, the Main Branch was opened at 1 p.m. on Sundays and 9 a.m. on all other days, and it closed at 10 p.m. each day. This was to encourage patrons to use the new library.[62][69] By 1926, the library was heavily patronized, with up to 1,000 people per hour requesting books. The library was most used between 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. and 3:30 to 5:50 p.m., and from October through May. The most highly requested books were those for economics and American and English literature, though during World War I geography books were the most demanded because of the ongoing war.[70] It was estimated that 4 million people per year used the Main Branch in 1928, up from 2 million in 1918[71] and 3 million in 1926.[72] There were 1.3 million books requested by nearly 600,000 people through call slips in 1927.[73] By 1934, though annual patronage held steady at 4 million visitors, the Main Branch had 3.61 million volumes in its collection.[74]

Due to the increased demand for books, new shelves were installed in the stockrooms and the cellars by the 1920s to accommodate the expanded stacks. However, this still proved to be insufficient.[73] The New York Public Library announced an expansion of the Main Branch in 1928.[71] Thomas Hastings prepared plans for new wings near the north and south sides of the structure, which would extend eastward toward Fifth Avenue, as well as a storage annex in Bryant Park to the west.[73] The expansion was planned to cost $2 million, but was never built.[75] After Hastings died in 1929, it was revealed that his will contained $100,000 for modifications to the facade, with which he had been dissatisfied.[76]

A theater collection was installed in the Main Reading Room in 1933.[77] Two years later, the Bryant Park Open-Air Reading Room was established, operating during the summer. The reading room was meant to improve the morale of readers during the Great Depression, and it operated until 1943, when it closed down due to a shortage of librarians.[78] In 1936, library trustee George F. Baker gave the Main Branch forty issues of the New-York Gazette from the 18th century, which had not been preserved anywhere else.[79] In 1937, the doctors Albert and Henry Berg made an offer to the library's trustees to donate their collections of rare English and American literature. After Henry died, the collection was dedicated in his memory.[80] The Berg Reading Room was formally dedicated in October 1940.[81]

During the 1930s, Works Progress Administration (WPA) workers helped maintain the Main Branch. Their tasks included upgrading the heating, ventilation, and lighting systems; refitting the treads on the branch's marble staircases; painting the bookshelves, walls, ceilings, and masonry; and general upkeep.[82][83] The WPA allocated $2.5 million for the building's maintenance.[84] In January 1936, it was announced that the Main Branch's roof would be renovated as part of a seven-month WPA project.[85]

1940s to 1970s

In 1942, the main exhibition room was converted into office space and partitioned off.[86] During World War II, the fifteen large windows in the Main Reading Room were blacked out, though they were later uncovered.[87] In the following years, the Main Reading Room became neglected: broken lighting fixtures were not replaced, and the room's windows were never cleaned.[87][88] Unlike during World War I, war-related books at the Main Branch did not become popular during World War II.[89] A room for members of the United States Armed Forces was opened in 1943.[90] In 1944, the New York Public Library proposed another expansion plan. The stacks' capacity would be increased to 3 million books, and the circulating library in the Main Branch would be moved to a new 53rd Street Library.[91] The circulating library at the Main Branch was ultimately kept for the time being, though its single room soon became insufficient to host all of the circulating volumes.[92] Subsequently, in 1949, the library asked the city to take over responsibility for the Main Branch's circulating and children's libraries.[93] As part of the modernization of the Main Branch, newly delivered books started being processed in that building, rather than at various circulation branch libraries.[94]

 
The Mid-Manhattan Library, which opened in 1970 and replaced the circulating library at the Main Branch

The rear of the library's main hall was partitioned off in 1950, creating a bursar's office measuring 42 by 13 ft (12.8 by 4.0 m).[95] Minor repairs at the Main Branch occurred during the 1960s. The city government allocated money for the installation of fire sprinklers in the main branch's stacks in 1960.[96] In 1964 contracts were awarded for the installation of a new floor level above the south corridor on the first floor, as well as for replacement of the skylights.[97] By the mid-1960s, the branch contained 7 million volumes[98] and had outgrown its 88 miles (142 km) of stacks.[99][100]

The circulating facilities at the Main Branch continued to grow, and in 1961, the New York Public Library convened a group of six librarians to look for a new facility for the circulating department.[92] The library bought the Arnold Constable & Company department store at 8 East 40th Street, at the southeast corner of Fifth Avenue and 40th Street across from the Main Branch.[101] The Main Branch's circulating collection was moved to the Mid-Manhattan Library in 1970.[92]

During the 1970s, the New York Public Library as a whole experienced financial troubles,[102] which were exacerbated by the 1975 New York City fiscal crisis.[68] As a cost-cutting measure, in 1970, the library decided to close the Main Branch during Sundays and holidays.[103] The library also closed the Main Branch's science and technology division in late 1971 to save money, but private funds allowed the division to reopen in January 1972.[104] The lions in front of the Main Branch's main entrance were restored in 1975.[105] By the end of the decade, the Main Branch was in disrepair and the NYPL trustees were raising money for the research library's continued upkeep.[100][106] The NYPL system was so short on funds that the research library was only open 43 hours a week until 1979, when Time Inc. and the Grace Krieble Delmas Foundation jointly donated $750,000 to extend the branch's operating hours.[106]

1980s and 1990s

Vartan Gregorian took over as president of the New York Public Library in 1981.[100][107][108] At the time, many of the Main Branch's interior spaces had been subdivided and extensively modified, with offices in many of the spaces.[100][108][109] The main exhibition room had been turned into an accounting office; the reading room's furniture had metal brackets screwed onto them; and there were lights, wires, and ducts hung throughout the space.[109] Gregorian organized events to raise money for the library, which helped raise funds for the cleaning of the facade and the renovation of the lobby, roof, and lighting system.[110] Architectural firm Davis Brody & Associates, architect Giorgio Cavaglieri, and architectural consultant Arthur Rosenblatt devised a master plan for the library.[100][111] Before the master plan was implemented, the D. S. and R. H. Gottesman Foundation gave $1.25 million in December 1981 for the restoration of the main exhibition room,[86] which was redesigned by Davis Brody and Cavaglieri.[100]

Workers erected a temporary construction fence around the library's terraces in 1982.[112][113] As part of a greater renovation of Bryant Park, Laurie Olin and Davis Brody redesigned the terraces, while Hugh Hardy redesigned the kiosks within the terraces.[100][114] Several rooms were restored as part of the plan.[113] The first space to be renovated, the periodical room, was completed in 1983 with a $20 million gift from Reader's Digest editor DeWitt Wallace.[115] The exhibition room reopened in May 1984 and was renamed the Gottesman Exhibition Hall.[116][117] The Catalog Room was restored starting in 1983.[118][119] Ten million catalog cards, many of which were tattered, were replaced with photocopies that had been created over six years at a cost of $3.3 million.[119][120] In addition, room 80 was renovated into a lecture hall called the Celeste Bartos Forum in 1987.[121][122] Offices were relocated to former storage rooms on the ground level.[108] Other divisions were added to the Main Branch during the 1980s, such as the Pforzheimer Collection of Shelley and His Circle in 1986,[123] and the Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs in 1987.[124] The terraces on Fifth Avenue reopened in 1988 after they were restored.[116]

 
Bryant Park, underneath which additional stacks were constructed in the late 1980s

Meanwhile, the library was adding 150,000 volumes to its collections annually, which could not fit within the stacks of the existing building.[116][99] In the late 1980s, the New York Public Library decided to expand the Main Branch's stacks to the west, underneath Bryant Park.[46][99] The project was originally estimated to cost $21.6 million and would be the largest expansion project in the Main Branch's history.[125] It was approved by the city's Art Commission in January 1987,[126] and construction on the stacks started in July 1988.[46] The expansion required that Bryant Park be closed to the public and then excavated, but because the park had grown dilapidated over the years, the stack-expansion project was seen as an opportunity to rebuild the park.[125] The library added more than 120,000 square feet (11,000 m2) of storage space and 84 miles (135 km) of bookshelves under Bryant Park, doubling the length of the stacks in the Main Branch.[116][99] The space could accommodate 3.2 million books and a half-million reels of microfilm.[116] The new stacks were connected to the Main Branch via a tunnel measuring 62 ft (19 m)[116] or 120 ft (37 m) long.[46] Once the underground facilities were completed, Bryant Park was completely rebuilt,[127] with 2.5 or 6 feet (0.76 or 1.83 m) of earth between the park surface and the storage facility's ceiling.[46][128] The extension was opened in September 1991 at a cost of $24 million;[46] however, it only included one of two planned levels of stacks.[129] Bryant Park was reopened in mid-1992 after a three-year renovation.[128]

The Catalog Room was renamed in 1994 for fashion designer Bill Blass, who gave $10 million to the NYPL.[118][130] The Main Reading Room was closed in July 1997 for renovations[131] designed by Davis Brody Bond.[132][133] The restoration entailed cleaning and repainting the ceiling, cleaning the windows, refinishing the wood, and removing partitions within the room.[88][118][134] Workers also replaced desk lamps and installed energy-efficient window panes.[135][136] The space was renamed the Rose Main Reading Room, after the children of a benefactor who had given $15 million toward the renovation.[87] The Reading Room reopened on November 16, 1998.[137][133] The same year, the New York State government allocated funding for the Main Branch to install computers and other electronic devices.[138] The Reading Room received new workstations, and the space was also redecorated to accommodate patrons' laptops.[139] The bungalow in the Library's South Court was taken apart the same year.[46][140]

21st-century changes

2000s: start of renovations

A four-story glass structure was erected on the site of the South Court, an enclosed courtyard on the Main Branch's south side, starting in the late 1990s. The structure cost $22.2 million and included a floor area of 42,220 square feet (3,922 m2).[141] Opened in 2002, the South Court structure was the first permanent above-ground addition to the Main Branch since its opening.[46] The pop-up reading room in Bryant Park was re-established in summer 2003. The "room" contained 700 books and 300 periodicals.[78]

By 2004, streaks were already blackening the white marble and pollution and moisture were corroding the ornamental statuary. According to The New York Times, "tiny particles of rubber scattered by passing car tires have accumulated on the building, mixing gradually with water to turn the marble into gypsum, which causes the outer layer to crumble in a sugaring effect." In December 2005, the Lionel Pincus and Princess Firyal Map Division space, with richly carved wood, marble, and metalwork, was restored.[142]

 
Restoration work on the building's facade, 2008
 
Plaque honoring Stephen A. Schwarzman's contributions

In 2007, the library announced that it would undertake a three-year, $50 million renovation of the building exterior, which had suffered damage from weathering and automobile exhaust. The marble structure and its sculptural elements were to be cleaned; three thousand cracks were to be repaired; and various components would be restored. All of the work was scheduled to be completed by the centennial in 2011.[143] Library director Paul LeClerc said in 2007 that "my ambition is for this to be the building you simply must see in New York at nighttime because it is so beautiful and it is so important." By late 2007, library officials had not yet decided whether to try to restore damaged sculptural elements or just clean and "stabilize" them. Cleaning would be done either with lasers or by applying poultices and peeling them off.[142]

Stephen A. Schwarzman donated $100 million toward the renovation and expansion of the building, and in April 2008, the library announced that the main branch building would be renamed in his honor. As a condition of the gift, Schwarzman's name would be displayed at each public entrance.[144][145] Later that year, British architect Norman Foster was chosen to design the Main Branch's renovation. To pay for the renovations, the New York Public Library was attempting to sell the Mid-Manhattan and Donnell branches, the latter of which had already found a buyer.[146] Nicolai Ouroussoff, former architecture critic for The New York Times, opined that Foster's selection was "one of a string of shrewd decisions by the library that should put our minds at ease".[147]

2010s: the Central Library Plan and after

By 2010, while renovations on the Main Branch were ongoing, the New York Public Library had cut back its staff and budget in other branches following the Great Recession of 2008.[148][149] In 2012, a Central Library Plan was announced, in which the nearby Mid-Manhattan Library and Science, Industry and Business Library would be closed, and that the Main Branch would be turned into a circulating library.[150][151] As part of the plan, over a million books would have been put into storage in the Research Collections and Preservation Consortium (ReCAP) warehouse in New Jersey, shared with Princeton University and Columbia University.[149] Although some critics praised the plan as a move that would allow visitors to make greater use of the Main Branch's research facilities,[152][153] a majority spoke out against it,[154][155][156] with one editorial deriding it as "cultural vandalism".[157] Academics, writers, architects and civic leaders signed a letter of protest against the plan,[158] and Princeton history professor Anthony Grafton wrote that "readers who want to consult a book will often have to order it in advance—and may find, as readers sometimes do here, that real delivery times are slower than advertised ones."[159] After a protracted six-year battle, and two public interest lawsuits, the Central Library Plan was abandoned in May 2014 due to pressure by its opponents and the election of Bill de Blasio as mayor.[160][161] Subsequently, an $8 million gift from Abby and Howard Milstein helped fund the renovation of the second level of stacks beneath Bryant Park, so that they could be used to store the books.[129] The controversy was damaging to the reputation of not only the library's board, but of its president, Anthony Marx. In a book about the drawn out, often secretive initiatives to sell real estate and remove the heart of a treasured landmark, Scott Sherman concluded that Marx and his wealthy supporters "lacked prudence: they applied radical, free market solutions to complex institutional problems. In the end, elected officials in New York City had to save the NYPL from its own trustees."[162]

In May 2014, one of the "gilded-plaster rosettes" in the ceiling of the Rose Main Reading Room fell to the floor.[163] The NYPL closed the Rose Main Reading Room and the Public Catalog Room for renovations. The $12 million restoration project included restoring the rosettes and supporting them with steel cables, as well as installing LED lamp fixtures.[164] The NYPL commissioned EverGreene Architectural Arts to recreate the mural in the Bill Blass Public Catalog Room, which had "suffered irreparable discoloration, overpainting and water damage" during its 105-year history.[165] The NYPL also replaced its historic chain-and-lift book conveyor system with a new delivery system using "book trains".[129] The restored Rose Main Reading Room and Bill Blass Public Catalog Room reopened on October 5, 2016.[166][167]

Starting in August 2017, the Main Branch temporarily hosted an interim circulating library at 42nd Street.[168] The interim library was to hold part of the collection of the Mid-Manhattan Library while the Mid-Manhattan building was closed for renovations, which were scheduled to be completed in 2020.[169] The Mid-Manhattan Branch's collection of pictures was also temporarily relocated to the Main Branch[170] until the circulating library reopened in 2020.[171][172]

In November 2017, the New York Public Library board approved a $317 million master plan for the Main Branch, which would be the largest renovation in the branch's history. The plan, designed by architecture firms Mecanoo and Beyer Blinder Belle, would increase publicly available space by 20 percent, add a new entrance at 40th Street, create the Center for Research and Learning for high-school and college students, add elevator banks, and expand space for exhibitions and researchers.[173][174] At the time of approval, $308 million of funds had been raised, and construction was expected to be completed in 2021.[175] The renovations began in July 2018 with the start of construction on the Lenox and Astor Room, a scholar's center, on the second floor.[176][177] The Landmarks Preservation Commission approved the 40th Street entrance with minor modifications in March 2019.[145] That August, the NYPL announced that the lions outside the Main Branch's front entrance would be restored in September and October at a cost of $250,000.[178][179]

Divisions

There are nine divisions at the New York Public Library's Main Branch, of which eight are special collections.[180]

General Research Division

The General Research Division is the main division of the Main Branch and the only one that is not a special collection. The division is based out of the Rose Main Reading Room and the Bill Blass Public Catalog Room. The division contains 43 million items in more than 430 languages.[181]

Milstein Division of U.S. History, Local History and Genealogy

The Irma and Paul Milstein Division of U.S. History, Local History and Genealogy houses one of the largest publicly available genealogical collections in North America. Though the division contains many New York City-related documents, it also contains documents collected from towns, cities, counties, and states across the U.S., as well as genealogies from around the world.[182] The division acquired the holdings of the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society in 2008.[183][184]

Map Division

 
The ornate wooden cornice of the Map Division

The Lionel Pincus and Princess Firyal Map Division was created in 1898. It contains more than 20,000 atlases and 433,000 sheet maps, dating to as early as the 16th century. The collection includes maps on local, regional, national, and global scales as well as city maps, topographic maps, and maps in antiquarian and digitized formats.[185]

Manuscripts and Archives Division

The Manuscripts and Archives Division comprises over 5,500 collections. These include, 700 cuneiform tablets, 160 illuminated manuscripts from the Middle Ages and Renaissance periods, notable people's and entities' papers, publishing archives, social and economics collections, and papers about the New York Public Library's history.[186] The division supplements similar divisions at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem, and the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center.[186]

Dorot Jewish Division

The Dorot Jewish Division contains documents about Jewish subjects and the Hebrew language. The division, founded in 1897, contains documents and books from the Astor and Lenox Libraries; the Aguilar Free Library; and the private collections of Leon Mandelstamm, Meyer Lehren, and Isaac Meyer. The division is named for the Dorot Foundation, who made a formal endowment for the Chief of Division in 1986.[187]

Berg Collection of English and American Literature

The Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Collection of English and American Literature contains rare books, first editions, and manuscripts in English and American literature. The collection includes over 35,000 works from 400 individual authors.[80] The collection was created in 1940 with a donation from Albert Berg in memory of his brother Henry,[81] and was formally endowed in 1941.[80] The initial collection comprised 3,500 books and pamphlets created by over 100 authors.[188][80] An additional 15,000 works came from Owen D. Young, who donated his private collection to the library in 1941.[80][189]

Pforzheimer Collection of Shelley and His Circle

The Carl H. Pforzheimer Collection of Shelley and His Circle is a collection of around 25,000 works from the English Romanticism genre, created in the 18th and 19th centuries. It was donated by the estate of oil financier Carl Pforzheimer in 1986. According to the New York Public Library's website, the collection contains works from English Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley; Shelley's second wife Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley and her family members, including William Godwin, Mary Wollstonecraft, and Claire Clairmont; and other contemporaries including "Lord Byron, Teresa Guiccioli, Thomas Jefferson Hogg, Leigh Hunt, Thomas Love Peacock, Horace Smith, and Edward John Trelawny".[123]

Rare Book Division

 
The Main Branch holds the Lenox Copy of the Gutenberg Bible, the first copy to be acquired by a United States citizen.[190]

The Rare Book Division requires pre-registration for researchers before they are allowed to enter. The collection includes 800 incunable works published in Europe before 1501, Americana published before 1801, and American newspapers published before 1865, as well as over 20,000 broadsides, old atlases, and works about voyages. The division also contains rare Bibles, including the first Gutenberg Bible to be brought to the U.S., the first Native American language Bible, and the first Bible created in the U.S. In addition, it includes first editions and copies from notable writers, including William Shakespeare, copies of The Pilgrim's Progress printed before 1700, Voltaire's entire work, and Walt Whitman's personal copies of his own work. The division houses rare artifacts as well, such as the first book printed in North America and the first English-language book printed in the U.S.[191]

Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs

The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs was created by a gift of the Wallach family in 1987. The collection includes over one million works of art as well as 700,000 monographs and periodicals.[124]

Exterior

The New York Public Library's Main Branch measures 390 feet (120 m) on its north–south axis by 270 feet (82 m) on its west–east axis.[44][62][142] The library is located on the east side of the block bounded by Fifth Avenue on the east, 40th Street on the south, Sixth Avenue on the west, and 42nd Street on the east.[192] The north end of the building sits above entrances to the Fifth Avenue station of the New York City Subway, serving the 7 and <7>​ trains.[193] The station was built as part of the Interborough Rapid Transit Company's Flushing Line,[194] and was opened in 1926 with a ceremony at the Main Branch.[195]

The marble on the library building is about three feet thick, and the structure is composed entirely of Vermont marble and brick.[142] Most of the exterior of the building is made of white Vermont marble, which includes both perpendicular and parallel cuts. The lowest section of the walls is made of granite, and there are also bronze windows, doors, grilles, and fixtures. Tennessee marble was used for the library's flagpole pedestals, seats, and lion sculptures.[196] During construction, the builders conducted quality checks on the marble, and 65 percent of the marble quarried for the Main Branch was rejected and used in other buildings such as Harvard Medical School.[46] The exterior is composed of 20,000 blocks of stone, each of which is numbered.[142] An elaborate cornice with sculpted figures wraps around the top of the structure's exterior.[64] The massing of the library building was intended to highlight its primary public spaces. There is a gable roof above the public catalog room, which is on axis with the main entrance on Fifth Avenue, as well as a hip roof above the main reading room, which runs north–south near the western end of the building.[197]

Fifth Avenue elevation

 
One of the lions at the main entrance to the New York Public Library

The Main Branch faces Fifth Avenue to the east;[64] this comprises the primary elevation of the building.[198] A terrace wraps along the Fifth Avenue elevation.[64][199] The terrace is 90 feet (27 m) deep and contains a granite balustrade.[198] The present design of the terrace dates to 1988, when it was resurfaced with granite, bluestone, and cobblestones. The terrace contains movable chairs and tables. Along the eastern edge of the terrace are two rows of Japanese locust trees.[116]

The Fifth Avenue entrance is reached by a grand marble stairway extending west from the terrace at 41st Street.[64] Two lion sculptures, made of Tennessee marble and sculpted by the Piccirilli Brothers based on a design by Edward Clark Potter, flank the stairway from 41st Street.[199][200][36] According to one legend, the lions flank the steps so patrons could read "between the lions".[201] They are a trademark of the New York Public Library, which uses a single stone lion as its logo.[200] Their original names, "Leo Astor" and "Leo Lenox" (in honor of the library's founders) were transformed into Lord Astor and Lady Lenox (although both lions are male), and in the 1930s they were nicknamed "Patience" and "Fortitude" by Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, who chose the names because he felt that the citizens of New York would need to possess these qualities to see themselves through the Great Depression. Patience is on the south side, to the left of the entrance stairway, and Fortitude on the north, to the right.[200][36] The lions were restored in 1975[105] and in 2007–2011,[200] and they were restored once again in late 2019.[178][179]

The Fifth Avenue pavilion consists of a portico with six Corinthian columns and three archways.[64][199] The Corinthian columns are placed on pedestals with rosettes and Greek-fret molding. These columns support a marble attic with six 11-foot-high (3.4 m) allegorical sculptures designed by Paul Wayland Bartlett; the figures flank three carved plaques, one each for the Astor, Lenox, and Tilden foundations.[198] The arches contain barrel vaults with the faces of the classical deities Juno, Minerva, and Mercury on their keystones. The faces initially all depicted Minerva, but Carrere and Hastings hired sculptor Francis Tonetti-Dozzi in 1909 to redo the outer two keystones.[198][202] The archways lead to the first floor of the structure, which is one story above ground level.[203] The arches contain bronze doors with marble frames and triangular pediments.[198] Hastings had drawn up a new design for the portico in 1921, but this was never constructed.[204] George Grey Barnard also designed pediments for sculptures to be installed above the main entrance, representing "Life" and "Painting and Sculpture".[205] When the sculptures were erected in 1915, he unsuccessfully sued the installers for $50,000 because they did not fit with his vision.[206]

On either side of the Fifth Avenue entrance pavilion, there are alcoves with sculptures of figures inside them, followed by five bays of windows.[64][198] Each bay contains arched windows on the first floor and rectangular windows on the second floor, above which is an attic with a marble balustrade.[207] According to architecture critic Henry Hope Reed Jr., the balustrade is similar to that at Versailles's Grand Trianon.[207][208] The bays are separated by Corinthian columns.[207] The alcoves on the Fifth Avenue facade contained figures sculpted by Frederic MacMonnies, representing beauty and wisdom.[44][204] These figures sit above small fountains inside the alcoves.[209] They were shut off from 1942 and 1957,[210] and again from the 1980s to 2015.[209] The outer ends of the facade are treated as end pavilions.[198] Barnard designed pediments for the end pavilions, which represented the arts and history; they are slightly asymmetrical and resemble the pediment above the main entrance. The corner pavilions also contain rusticated quoins as well as stone piers.[211]

Northern and southern elevations

 
One of two bronze flagpole bases at the 42nd Street entrance, sculpted by Raffaele Menconi

The northern and southern facades of the building are located along 42nd and 40th Streets, respectively. The northern and southern elevations were treated as side elevations, and the windows on these elevations illuminate secondary spaces inside the library.[212] Both elevations measure 11 bays wide and are nearly identical to each other.[213] Cornices run above the northern and southern elevations, connecting the primary elevations on Fifth Avenue and Bryant Park.[212] The northern side contains an entrance to the ground level, while the southern side was not built with a public entrance.[203][213] The northern entrance is at the center of that elevation and is topped by a pediment.[213]

The northern entrance is flanked by flagpoles whose sculpted bronze bases were designed in 1912 by Thomas Hastings. They were realized by the sculptor Raffaele Menconi, who often worked closely with New York architects of the Beaux-Arts generation.[214] Each of the bronze bases is supported by four tortoises and contains cast-bronze ornament, in addition to personifications of conquest, civilization, discovery, and navigation.[215] The bronzes were cast at Tiffany Studios in Long Island City.[214][215] They are dedicated to New York's former Reform mayor, John Purroy Mitchell.[215][216]

The building contained an enclosed courtyard on its south side called the South Court, measuring 80 by 80 feet (24 by 24 m). It was originally a drop-off location for horse carriages.[141] The court contained a marble fountain and horse trough, with a bungalow erected in 1919 as an employees' break area. The fountain was destroyed in 1950 and replaced with a parking lot, and the bungalow was taken apart in 1998.[46][140][133] A six-story glass structure was erected on the site of the South Court, opening in 2002.[133][217] The current structure measures 73 by 73 feet (22 by 22 m) and is connected to the rest of the library building via glass bridges.[133][141] Below the South Court structure is a 174-seat auditorium, accessed via a glass staircase cut into the original basement.[133][217] The first story contains the Bartos Education Center, with two classrooms and an orientation theater. The second through fourth floors contain offices, and the fourth floor also contains a quiet room and staff lounge.[217]

Bryant Park elevation

 
The library's west side (bottom left) faces Bryant Park

The west side, which faces Bryant Park, contains narrow vertical windows that illuminate the stacks inside the Main Branch.[64][218] The narrow windows allow light to enter the stacks below the third-floor Rose Main Reading Room. Above the tall windows, near the top of the facade, are nine large arched windows that illuminate the reading room itself.[62][218] The presence of the narrow windows may have been intended to evoke the appearance of a flat colonnade.[213] Next to the center of the facade is a statue of William Cullen Bryant, sculpted by Herbert Adams; the statue is placed on a plinth and sheltered by a half-dome supported by Doric columns.[219][220]

Near the top of the facade are eight doorways with pediments, which were part of the original design.[221][222] Although NYPL staff were unable to ascertain why these doorways were built,[222] they may have been built in anticipation of an unbuilt expansion of the stacks toward Bryant Park.[221] There is a projecting cornice and a hip roof above the center section of the stacks and reading room. The northern and southern ends of the Bryant Park elevation both contain pavilions, similar to those on Fifth Avenue.[223]

Interior

The interior of the Main Branch consists of four publicly accessible floors: the ground level and the first through third floors.[203] There is a corridor along the eastern side of each floor, which runs the length of the building from north to south.[199][224] The building also contains two light courts, measuring three by three bays wide, which separate each floor into four-bay-wide sections to the west and east.[224] Originally, the interior collectively contained more than 200 rooms, and the building had a footprint of 115,000 square feet (10,700 m2).[44] Generally, lower room numbers are located on the south side of the building, and higher room numbers on the north side.[203][225] Many spaces contain quarry-tile floors; walls with shelves or wood paneling; and molded plaster ceilings.[226] The interior contains ornate detail from Carrère and Hastings, such as motifs of lions,[36] and the decorative scheme extended to such minute details as doorknobs and wastebaskets.[46]

There is a pair of public stairways on the north side of the building, which lead between the ground and third floors. The stairs share landings in the middle of each flight, allowing visitors to switch between staircases.[203][227] The stairways contain vaulted ceilings made of Vermont marble; they are separated by solid marble floors, except at the landings, where there are square archways. These stairways may have been influenced by the design of the Louvre's Henry II Wing.[227]

The cellar, which is not open to the public, was initially used as a mechanical plant[199] and contains remnants of the original Croton Reservoir.[20][199] The western side of the building, from the cellar to the second floor, contains part of the Main Branch's storage stacks. Supplementing the Main Reading Room on the third floor, there are 21 other reading rooms in the Main Branch, including a ground-floor room with a cast-iron ceiling.[199] There were originally 1,760 seats in all of the reading rooms combined, of which 768 were located in the Main Reading Room.[228]

Ground floor

 
Detailing in the Public Catalog Room

The ground floor contains the entrance to 42nd Street.[203] Originally it contained a coat-check, circulating library, newspaper room, and children's-book room. There were also spaces for telephones, a "library-school office", and a "travelling-library office".[69] The former newspaper room in room 78 became the children's-book room, and the former children's-book room in room 81 is not open to the public.[69][203]

Room 80 operated as the circulating library from 1911 to 1981.[121] It measures 80 by 80 feet (24 by 24 m) across.[121][122] The room is placed at the center of the building, but its ground-floor location indicates that the library's trustees did not see the circulating library as an important part of the building's plan.[229] The glass ceiling measures 30 feet (9.1 m) tall and is supported by four iron arches; it was covered by a dropped ceiling for much of the mid-20th century. Since 1987, room 80 has been the Bartos Forum, a 400-seat lecture room.[121][122] Most of the Bartos Forum's original design remains in place, but the floors have been covered with carpets and the perimeter skylights have been sealed.[139]

First floor

Above the ground floor is the first floor. The staircase entrance from Fifth Avenue opens up into the first-floor lobby, known as Astor Hall.[62][230] This floor contains the Picture Collection (room 100), Wallace Periodical Room (room 108), and Jewish Division (room 111, former Periodicals Room) on the south side. On the north side are the Milstein Division (room 121, former Patents Room), Milstein Microforms (room 119), and Map Division (room 117). The Wachenheim Gallery, the library shop, the Bartos Education Center, and the Gottesman Hall (room 111, former Exhibition Room) are located in rooms that open into Astor Hall.[203][230] The first floor also formerly contained various supervisors' offices, a library for the blind, and a technology room.[230] The north–south corridor extends the entire width of the first floor, with large windows overlooking the street at either end; the ceiling was painted to resemble carved wood.[231]

Astor Hall

 
Astor Hall, on the first floor

Astor Hall is the first-floor lobby,[62][203][232] reached from the portico at the top of the Fifth Avenue stairs.[64][199][232] The hall measures 70 by 44 feet (21 by 13 m),[232] corresponding to three north–south bays and two west–east bays.[224] The walls and ceiling are clad in Vermont marble.[224] The ceiling is a 34-foot-high (10 m) shallow barrel vault,[232] decorated with rectangular molded frames that consist of various motifs. Although the ceiling was intended to be a self-supporting structure, it is reinforced by a layer of concrete below the second floor.[224] The pillars on the west and east walls are topped by egg-and-dart moldings, and there are marble candelabras next to these walls.[224] There are arched openings at the top of the western wall, which support the ceiling, underneath which are archways leading to the first-floor rooms.[232][233] The north and south walls contain piers.[234] The names of major donors are inscribed on the pillars.[156]

There are two grand marble staircases on the north and south walls.[62][224][233] The staircases ascend several steps away from the hall before turning 90 degrees westward at a landing and ascending parallel to each other toward the second floor, behind the piers on the north and south walls.[232][234] There are bronze busts of Carrère and Hastings, created in 1940 and 1935 respectively, at the landings of the stairways. The Carrère bust is near the south (left) stair, while the Hastings bust is near the north (right) stair.[22][232] At the second floor, a mezzanine level overlooks the west side of the lobby, behind the arches.[108][234] Another pair of staircases continues to the McGraw Rotunda on the third floor.[235][236] Each staircase passes through another landing, which has a domed ceiling and a hanging chandelier.[236]

Other spaces

 
Interior of the Wallace Periodical Room

The Wallace Periodical Room in room 108 has been named for Reader's Digest founder DeWitt Wallace since 1983.[115][237] It consists of current issues from 200 periodicals and 22 newspapers.[237] The current design of the room dates from a renovation in the 1980s.[238] The Periodical Room contains 13 murals of scenes from the history of New York City, which were designed by Richard Haas,[115][239] The original design included cast-iron radiators,[238] which were replaced with an air-circulation system under the windows.[239] In addition, the room contains bronze chandeliers and sculptured ceilings.[239]

Behind Astor Hall's information desk is the Gottesman Exhibition Hall. It served as the Main Branch's primary display area from 1911 to 1942 and was subsequently divided into offices.[86] The space reopened in 1984.[117] The Gottesman Exhibition Hall is made of Vermont marble[240][241] and is accessed by large bronze or wrought-iron doors.[241][242] The room measures 83 by 77 feet (25 by 23 m) across and 18 feet (5.5 m) high. The room contains Vermont marble pilasters and columns, as well as bronze and leaded glass chandeliers hanging from a carved-oak ceiling.[240][242] The ceiling largely contains sunken panels with various Renaissance-style decorations, but the outer section of the ceiling has octagonal coffers.[242][243] The floor includes a grid of circles and rhombuses.[242]

Second floor

The second floor contains the Jill Kupin Rose Gallery,[203] which contains ongoing exhibitions.[244] This floor contains several small rooms extending to the north, west, and south.[203] One of these is the Wachenheim Trustees' Room, which contains wood paneling, parquet floors, and a fireplace made of white marble.[199][245] Originally, this level contained director's and assistant director's offices; the Slavonic, Jewish, and Oriental Collections; and rooms for science, economics and sociology, and public documents.[246] The former science room at room 225 is now the Cullman Center, while room 228, the former economics and sociology room, has been split into two rooms.[203][246] As on the first floor, the second floor's north–south corridor extends the entire width of the floor, but the ceiling was made of plaster to save money.[231]

Third floor

The McGraw Rotunda is on the east side of the building's third floor.[203] The Print Gallery extends south from the rotunda; one publicly accessible room, the Wallach Division, is adjacent to the gallery. Similarly, the Stokes Gallery extends northward, with the Berg and Pforzheimer Collections branching off of it.[203] The Salomon Room branches off the McGraw Rotunda to the east. To the west is the Bill Blass Public Catalog Room, which leads into the large Rose Main Reading Room.[203] Unlike on the first and second stories, the main north–south corridor does not span the entire length of the third floor, as there are offices on either end.[224]

McGraw Rotunda

 
The McGraw Rotunda contains numerous murals by Edward Laning.
 
Laning's ceiling mural depicts Prometheus.

The McGraw Rotunda (formerly Central Hall), despite its name, is a rectangular barrel-vaulted space.[235][236] The rotunda measures three bays wide from north to south and two bays wide from west to east. On the north and south walls, the western bay is occupied by the main corridor, while the eastern bay contains stairs from Astor Hall.[236] The Public Catalog Room is to the west, and the Salomon Room is to the east.[203][235] The entrances to both rooms are flanked by freestanding marble pedestals;[240] the Salomon Room also contains a pair of bronze double doors with carved panels.[247] The floors are made of Hauteville and Gray Siena marble.[240] The rotunda's walls contain red marble bases with dark wood piers, topped by a Corinthian entablature with dentils and modillions.[235][236][240] The piers support a plaster[235] or stucco barrel vault.[240] On the north and south ends of the barrel vault are glazed semicircular windows.[236][240] There are alcoves on the side walls, supported by columns with Corinthian capitals, which were intended to contain murals.[235]

The rotunda contains a set of panels painted by Edward Laning in the early 1940s as part of a WPA project. The work includes four large panels, two lunettes above doorways to the Public Catalog and Salomon Rooms, and a ceiling mural painted on the barrel vault. The four panels are located on the east and west walls and depict the development of the written word. The lunette above the Public Catalog Room's doorway is "Learning to Read", and the lunette about the Salomon Room's doorway is "The Student".[235][248] The ceiling mural is called "Prometheus Bringing Fire to Men".[235] The four panels and two lunettes were completed in 1940,[248] and the ceiling mural was completed in 1942.[235]

Rose Main Reading Room

The Main Branch's Deborah, Jonathan F. P., Samuel Priest, and Adam R. Rose Main Reading Room, officially Room 315 and commonly known as the Rose Main Reading Room, is located on the third floor of the Main Branch.[203] The room is 78 by 297 feet (24 by 91 m) with a ceiling measuring about 52 feet high.[236][62][139][132] Characterized by Robert A. M. Stern as one of the United States' largest column-free rooms,[139] it is nearly as large as the Main Concourse at Grand Central Terminal.[62] It was originally described as being in the Renaissance architectural style,[53][249] but Matthew Postal described the room as having a Beaux-Arts design.[118] Half of the space was used as an office and service center prior to the late 1990s.[132] The Main Reading Room was renovated and renamed for the Rose family in 1998–1999;[118][137][250] and further renovations to its ceiling were completed in 2016.[250][167] The room became a New York City designated landmark in 2017.[251]

The room is separated into two sections of equal size by a book-delivery desk.[252][253] The desk is made of oak and is covered by a canopy,[254] with arches held up by Tuscan columns.[252][253] The north hall leads to the Manuscripts and Archives Reading Room, while the south hall leads to the Art and Architecture Reading Room, both of which are designed in a similar style to the main room.[62][255] Picture taking is only allowed in a small section of the south hall.[62] The doorways into the Main Reading Room contain large round pediments, which contrast with the smaller triangular pediments in the branch's other reading rooms.[256] There is intricate detail on the room's smaller metalwork, such as doorknobs and hinges.[249] The floors of the Main Reading Room and the connected Catalog Room are composed of red tiles, with marble pavers set in between the tiles, which indicate how the furniture should be arranged.[256] The marble pavers demarcate the boundaries of the aisles.[249]

 
The Rose Main Reading Room, facing south

The Main Reading Room is furnished with low wooden tables and chairs.[249][257] There are two arrays of tables in each hall, separated by a wide aisle; each table has four brass lamps.[249] The tables each measure 23 by 4 feet (7.0 by 1.2 m).[258] Originally, there were 768 seats,[259] but this was reduced to 490 in the late 20th century.[132] The seating capacity has since been increased to 624[249] or 636.[132] Each spot at each table is assigned a number. The room is also equipped with desktop computers providing access to library collections and the Internet, as well as docking facilities for laptops.[50][258] The NYPL installed 48 desktop computers near the central book-delivery desk. Thirty of the room's forty-two wooden tables have power outlets, while twelve of the tables have no outlets and are intended only for reading.[258] Readers may fill out forms requesting books brought to them from the library's closed stacks, which are delivered to the indicated seat numbers.[50]

Surrounding the room are thousands of reference works on open shelves along the room's main and balcony levels, which may be read openly.[199][252] At the time of the library's opening, there were about 25,000 freely accessible reference works on the shelves.[228] There are three levels of bookshelves: two on the main floor beneath the balcony, and one on the balcony.[252] Above the top level of shelves is a duct carrying wiring and cables for the room.[258]

 
The ornate decorated ceiling of the Rose Main Reading Room

The walls are made of Caen stone and are designed to resemble limestone.[260] Massive windows and grand chandeliers illuminate the space.[252][257][261] There are eighteen grand archways, of which fifteen contain windows: nine face Bryant Park to the west, and six face east. The other three archways form a wall with the Public Catalog Room to its east, and the middle archway also contains windows that face into the Catalog Room.[252][257] Each window contains low emissivity glass.[136] There are two rows of nine chandeliers in the Main Reading Room,[261] decorated with such details as satyr masks and acanthus leaves.[257] These were originally fitted with incandescent light bulbs, an innovation at the time of the library's opening, and were powered by the library's own power plant.[261] The lights on the chandeliers are arranged like an inverted cone, with four tiers of light bulbs.[252]

The plaster ceiling is supported on wire mesh, since there are no columns within the room.[262] The ceiling is painted to emulate gilded wood, with moldings of classical and figurative details.[263] The Klee-Thomson Company plastered the ceiling.[264] According to Matthew Postal, the moldings include "scroll cartouches bordered by cherubs, nude female figures with wings, cherub heads, satyr masks, vases of fruit, foliate moldings, and disguised ventilation grilles."[263] The moldings frame a three-part mural, created by James Wall Finn and completed in 1911.[140][265] Though no clear photographs exist of the mural's original appearance, the mural in its present incarnation depicts clouds and sky.[263] When the ceiling was restored in 1998, the original mural was deemed to be unsalvageable, and Yohannes Aynalem instead painted a reproduction.[136][140][266] The ceiling was restored again from 2014 to 2016.[167] Heating and ventilation grilles are embedded within the walls and ceiling.[257]

Public Catalog Room

 
The entrance to the Bill Blass Public Catalog Room (bottom left) through the McGraw Rotunda

The Bill Blass Public Catalog Room, also located in Room 315, connects the McGraw Rotunda and the Main Reading Room;[203][236] its central location makes it a de facto foyer for the reading room.[256] The room measures 81 by 77 feet (25 by 23 m).[62] Similar to the Main Reading Room, it has a 52-foot-high ceiling.[17] Four chandeliers, of identical design to those in the Main Reading Room, hang from the ceiling.[252] The ceiling of the Public Catalog Room also contains a 27-by-33-foot (8.2 by 10.1 m) section of James Wall Finn's 1911 mural.[265] The building's light courts abut the room's northern and southern walls.[236]

The first renovation of the Catalog Room may have taken place in 1935,[118] when its ceiling was repainted.[83] Further modifications occurred in 1952 when metal cabinets replaced the original oak cabinets as a result of the catalog room's quick expansion, with 150,000 new catalog cards being added each year.[118][267] The Catalog Room was restored in 1983[119] and renamed for Bill Blass in 1994.[130] Computers were added following the 1980s expansion.[268]

There is an information desk on the north side on the room, to the right when entering from the rotunda.[256][236] Originally, visitors would receive card slips with numbers on them and then be directed to one of the Main Reading Room's halves based on their card number.[259][256] The Public Catalog Room also contains waist-high oak desks on the south side.[249][236] These desks contain computers that allow New York Public Library cardholders to search the library's catalog.[269]

Salomon Room

 
The Salomon Room

The Edna Barnes Salomon Room, located east of the McGraw Rotunda in Room 316,[203] is usually utilized as an event space.[270] It has wooden tables, glass exhibit cases, and a coved ceiling with a skylight.[247] The 4,500-square-foot (420 m2) space was originally intended as a picture gallery, and oil paintings still hang on the walls. In 2009, it was converted to a "wireless Internet reading and study room" to provide overflow capacity for internet users who cannot fit in the Main Reading Room.[271]

Non-public stacks

The stacks within the Schwarzman Building are a main feature of the building. Housed beneath the Rose Main Reading Room are a series of stacks, which hold an estimated 2.5 million books.[a] At the time of the branch's opening, the stacks could hold 2.7 million books on 63.3 miles (101.9 km) of shelves.[44][228] There were another 500,000[228] or 800,000 books stored in various reading rooms.[44] The central stacks, as they are called, have a capacity of 3.5 million books[8] across 88 miles of bookshelves,[99] spanning seven stories.[255][129] The stacks contain marble floors, as well as iron shelves that are set back from the windows facing Bryant Park.[255] As of 2015, the Main Branch hosts 300,000 books in various reading rooms, though there are none in the central stacks themselves, due to the deteriorated condition of the stacks.[8] There were proposals to demolish the central stacks to make room for the Mid-Manhattan Branch as part of the unrealized Central Library Plan in the early 2010s.[272] As of 2019, the library's trustees have still not determined how to use the abandoned stacks in the main building.[273][c]

Another 84 miles of stacks under Bryant Park was added in an expansion between 1987 and 1991.[46][99] The Bryant Park stacks comprise two levels of climate-controlled storage areas.[129] The stacks under Bryant Park contain 1.2 million books on what is called "Level 1",[8] which was completed in the 1991 expansion. A second level of stacks below it, "Level 2", had not been finished when the 1991 expansion was opened.[129] Another 2.5 million books were being moved from the NYPL's ReCAP warehouse in New Jersey to Level 2 as of 2015, and when that was finished, the number of books in the Main Branch's stacks would rise to four million.[8] The Level 2 stacks are called the "Milstein Stacks", after a major donor,[129] and opened in January 2017.[274] As of 2017, the stacks also contain about 400,000 circulating volumes that are usually housed in the Mid-Manhattan Branch, which was closed for renovations until 2020.[272]

Books are delivered from the Bryant Park stacks to the reading rooms on the first through third floors using the "book train". The $2.6 million book delivery system was installed in 2016. It contains a conveyor belt and 24 small red carts emblazoned with the library's lion logo, which each carry up to 30 pounds (14 kg) of books between the stacks and the reading rooms. Each cart moves 75 feet (23 m) per minute and use gears to climb steep or vertical grades.[129][275] Prior to the installation of the "book train", a Ferris wheel-style conveyor system was installed in the 1990s;[258] it took ten minutes to retrieve a book using the old system,[276] The "Ferris wheel" system, which was complemented by a dumbwaiter, itself replaced a 1920s-era book-delivery system and a 1960s-era dumbwaiter.[258] The new book-delivery system was described as being twice as fast as the old system.[129]

Library Way

Leading up to the Main Branch, on 41st Street between Park and Fifth Avenues, is a series of plaques known as Library Way. Library Way comprises a series of illustrated bronze sidewalk plaques featuring quotes from famous authors, poets, and other notables. It features 48 unique plaques in all, but each plaque is duplicated along the north and the south sides of 41st Street, thus totaling 96 plaques.[277] According to The Wall Street Journal, a panel composed of "the Grand Central Partnership, which manages the Grand Central Business Improvement District; and the New Yorker magazine" chose the quotes in the 1990s, while Gregg LeFevre designed the plaques.[278][279] Each plaque measures 2.5 feet (0.76 m) wide and 1.5 feet (0.46 m) long; originally, there were 98 such plaques. The first three, by Francis Bacon, Emily Dickinson, and Virginia Woolf, were installed in front of 18 East 41st Street in 2002.[280]

Brochures are available at the Friends of the Library counter in the Main Branch's Astor Hall, on the first floor.[281][282] Granite plaques of similar style can also be seen on the sidewalks of Broadway in Manhattan's Financial District, placed in honor of ticker tape parades held there in the past, as well as on Broadway in the Garment District, where plaques commemorate fashion designers.[283]

Landmark designations

The Main Branch was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1965[1][98] and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1966.[2] The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the exterior as a landmark in 1967.[284] The Landmarks Preservation Commission subsequently designated Astor Hall, the first-to-third-floor stairs, and McGraw Rotunda as landmarks in 1974.[285][286] The Rose Main Reading Room and Public Catalog Room were separately made New York City designated landmarks in 2017,[287][251] after a four-year effort.[288]

In popular culture

Main article: New York Public Library in popular culture

Film

The Main Branch appears or is depicted in multiple films, including:

Television

Episodes of TV series that depicted the Main Branch included "The Library", an episode of Seinfeld,[294] as well as "The Persistence of Memory", the eleventh part of Carl Sagan's TV series Cosmos.[295]

Literature

The Main Branch also appears in literature, including:

Poems include:

Excerpts from several of the many memoirs and essays mentioning the Main Branch are included in the anthology Reading Rooms (1991), including reminiscences by Alfred Kazin, Henry Miller, and Kate Simon.[308]

See also

References

Notes

  1. ^ a b c The number of items varies widely between 1.8 and 4 million, and a figure of 3.5 million is often cited. However, in 2015, the New York Public Library said that the Main Branch's collection numbered 2.5 million.[8]
  2. ^ As the flagship building of the New York Public Library system, the Main Branch is often referred to as just the New York Public Library. Furthermore, the branch itself was originally called the Central Building[6] and was later known as the Humanities and Social Science Center.[7]
  3. ^ Other libraries, including the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris and the Library of Congress, renovated similar stacks so as to continue their original uses.

Citations

  1. ^ a b . National Historic Landmark summary listing. National Park Service. September 16, 2007. Archived from the original on December 5, 2007.
  2. ^ a b "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. January 23, 2007.
  3. ^ Landmarks Preservation Commission 1967.
  4. ^ Landmarks Preservation Commission 1974.
  5. ^ Postal 2017.
  6. ^ Handbook of the New York Public Library. New York public library. 1921. p. 7. Retrieved January 10, 2016. The Central Building of The New York Public Library
  7. ^ Cummings, Judith (December 15, 1976). "Library Will Get $3 Million Grant From U.S. Fund". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 23, 2018.
  8. ^ a b c d e "A Slippery Number: How Many Books Can Fit in the New York Public Library?". The New York Times. November 28, 2015. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 23, 2018.
  9. ^ a b Landmarks Preservation Commission 1967, p. 2.
  10. ^ Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 288.
  11. ^ "City Will Accept Mr. Carnegie's Libraries: Formal Action by the Board of Estimate to Be Taken Tomorrow". The New York Times. March 17, 1901. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved July 25, 2017.
  12. ^ a b c "New Library Ready Early Next Year: That Is, the Great Marble Structure Will Open if There Are No More Delays". The New York Times. May 2, 1910. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 16, 2018.
  13. ^ a b c d e f g h Postal 2017, p. 2.
  14. ^ Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 415.
  15. ^ Reed 2011, pp. 1–10.
  16. ^ Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 287.
  17. ^ a b Postal 2017, p. 1.
  18. ^ "Public Library's Home: A Strong Feeling in Favor of the Fifth Avenue Reservoir Site". The New York Times. March 26, 1895. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 17, 2018.
  19. ^ a b Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 286.
  20. ^ a b Carlson, Jen (January 16, 2015). "This Massive Reservoir Used To Be In Midtown". Gothamist. Retrieved July 18, 2022.
  21. ^ Hewitt et al. 2006, pp. 288–289.
  22. ^ a b c d Postal 2017, p. 3.
  23. ^ a b Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 289.
  24. ^ Hewitt et al. 2006, pp. 289–290.
  25. ^ a b "Public Library Blocked: Mayor Van Wyck Opposes an Issue of $150,000 in Bonds to Prepare the Site". The New York Times. March 24, 1898. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 17, 2018.
  26. ^ Hewitt et al. 2006, pp. 290–291.
  27. ^ "New York Public Library: Eighty-Eight Designs Submitted for the Building—Twelve Will Be Selected". The New York Times. July 17, 1897. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 17, 2018.
  28. ^ a b c d Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 291.
  29. ^ "Public Library Designs: Competition Closed, and the Jury Will Select Three Plans". The New York Times. November 2, 1897. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 17, 2018.
  30. ^ Hewitt et al. 2006, pp. 291–292.
  31. ^ "The New Public Library; Carrere & Hastings's Design for a Great Building Adopted by the Trustees". The New York Times. November 12, 1897. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  32. ^ a b Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 292.
  33. ^ "Model of the New Library: Now on Exhibition in the Governor's Room at City Hall". The New York Times. December 30, 1900. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 17, 2018.
  34. ^ a b c d e f Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 296.
  35. ^ "Where a Thousand May Read: Architect Carrere Describes Future New York Public Library". The New York Times. February 14, 1909. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  36. ^ a b c d Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 306.
  37. ^ "The New Public Library: Board of Estimate and Apportionment Approves the Carrere & Hastings Design". The New York Times. December 2, 1897. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 17, 2018.
  38. ^ Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 294.
  39. ^ a b c d e f Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 295.
  40. ^ "A Woman Sues John J. O'Brien; Maude L. Curran Seeks to Recover $1,608.75 from the ex-Aiderman". The New York Times. June 8, 1899. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  41. ^ a b c d e f g Postal 2017, p. 4.
  42. ^ "Big Water Main Bursts". The New York Times. November 15, 1900. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved August 13, 2019.
  43. ^ "Trouble over the Library Contract: The Lowest Bidder Asserts that He Was Unjustly Treated". The New York Times. June 26, 1901. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  44. ^ a b c d e f g Gray, David (March 1911). "A Temple of Modern Education: New York's New Public Library". Harper's Monthly Magazine. Vol. 122, no. 730. pp. 562–564. Retrieved December 20, 2018.
  45. ^ "Senator Dubois Explains Idaho Republican Victory: It Is Attributable to Passage of Irrigation Act by Last Congress, He Says". The New York Times. November 11, 1902. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  46. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q "Stephen A. Schwarzman Building Facts". The New York Public Library. November 10, 1902. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  47. ^ "Extension of Contract Not Asked". New-York Tribune. August 25, 1904. p. 4. Retrieved December 18, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  48. ^ "Last Library Work". New-York Tribune. January 28, 1907. p. 4. Retrieved December 18, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  49. ^ "More Library Delay". New-York Tribune. December 16, 1906. p. 24. Retrieved December 18, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  50. ^ a b c d e "History of The New York Public Library". The New York Public Library. Retrieved December 17, 2018.
  51. ^ "Moving a Million Books into the New Library: Transfer of the Lenox and Astor Library Contents to the Beautiful New Building at Forty-Second Street and Fifth Avenue a Big Undertaking". The New York Times. April 16, 1911. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 16, 2018.
  52. ^ "City Light Plant for Library Beaten: Board of Estimate Votes It Down After Proof That it Would Save $27,000 Yearly". The New York Times. March 20, 1909. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  53. ^ a b "New York's Fine New Library Nearly Completed: Will Be Ready Before the Contract Time, and Needs Only the Interior Furnishings". The New York Times. December 11, 1910. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  54. ^ "New Library Nearly Done: Contractors Now Expect to Complete Their Work by May 1". The New York Times. November 26, 1910. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  55. ^ "2,000 View Body of John M. Carrere: Prominent Men and Women in Throng That Passes Coffin in New Public Library Rotunda". The New York Times. March 4, 1911. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  56. ^ a b "City's $29,000,000 Library Is Opened: Golden Key of the Marble Structure Delivered, President Taft Making the Principal Address". The New York Times. May 24, 1911. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 16, 2018.
  57. ^ a b c "New York's Public Library Opened". Buffalo Commercial. May 23, 1911. p. 2. Retrieved December 18, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  58. ^ Hewitt et al. 2006, pp. 296–297.
  59. ^ a b Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 285.
  60. ^ "50,000 Visitors See New Public Library; Attendants Busy Preventing Confusion as They Inspect the Great Building". The New York Times. May 25, 1911. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  61. ^ Anderson, David (May 26, 1961). "Library Tricked on First Request: Clerk Reveals 'Failure' in '11 Was a Publicity Stunt". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  62. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Postal 2017, p. 5.
  63. ^ "New Library Ready Early Next Year: That Is, the Great Marble Structure Will Open if There Are No More Delays". The New York Times. May 2, 1910. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  64. ^ a b c d e f g h i Landmarks Preservation Commission 1967, p. 1.
  65. ^ Hewitt et al. 2006, p. 322.
  66. ^ "Great Crowds at Library: Three Interesting Exhibitions Mark the Second Week in the New Building". The New York Times. June 1, 1911. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  67. ^ Huxtable, Ada Louise (January 24, 1971). "Architecture". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 20, 2018.
  68. ^ a b c d e "The Tuition Is Free at 'Every Man's University'". Democrat and Chronicle. Rochester, NY. August 14, 1976. p. 8. Retrieved December 22, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  69. ^ a b c Central Building Guide 1912, pp. 7, 9.
  70. ^ Gee, Henrietta (April 18, 1926). "Behind the Scenes at the Library". Brooklyn Daily Eagle. p. 107. Retrieved December 18, 2018 – via Brooklyn Public Library; Newspapers.com.
  71. ^ a b Barnard, Eunice Fuller (September 16, 1928). "The Silent Adviser of All New York: The Public Library, Serving Every Tongue and Quest, Will Expand Its Outgrown Fifth Avenue Building". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  72. ^ "3,000,000 Visited Library in Year: 10,877,171 Books Issued for Home Use in the City, Report Shows". The New York Times. June 13, 1929. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  73. ^ a b c "Library to Build 5th. Av. Extensions: Plans Two Wings and New Unit in Bryant Park Subject to City's Approval". The New York Times. August 24, 1928. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  74. ^ "Readers Utilizing Leisure Hours Increase Library Attendance 40%". The Sun and the Erie County Independent. Hamburg, NY. September 6, 1934. p. 8. Retrieved December 18, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  75. ^ "$2,000,000 Annex to Public Library in New Projects". Brooklyn Daily Eagle. September 30, 1928. p. 47. Retrieved December 18, 2018 – via Brooklyn Public Library; Newspapers.com.
  76. ^ "Hastings Will Asks Change In Library: Architect of Building on Fifth Avenue Wanted Its Facade Improved". The New York Times. November 7, 1929. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  77. ^ "Stage History". Brooklyn Daily Eagle. June 4, 1933. p. 22. Retrieved December 18, 2018 – via Brooklyn Public Library; Newspapers.com.
  78. ^ a b Collins, Glenn (May 27, 2003). "'Leaves of Grass,' Anyone? A Reading Room Returns to Bryant Park". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  79. ^ "Library Acquires Lost City History; It Is Contained in 40 Copies of The New-York Gazette". The New York Times. June 8, 1936. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  80. ^ a b c d e "About the Berg Collection". The New York Public Library. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  81. ^ a b "Berg Memorial Room Which Was Dedicated Yesterday". The New York Times. October 12, 1940. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  82. ^ "Library Branches Renovated by 1,300 On Rolls of WPA". Brooklyn Daily Eagle. September 5, 1935. p. 16. Retrieved December 18, 2018 – via Brooklyn Public Library; Newspapers.com.
  83. ^ a b "Relief Workers Repair Libraries: All City's Buildings, Including That at 5th Av. and 42d St., Are Being Renovated". The New York Times. June 30, 1935. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  84. ^ "$2,500,000 WPA Fund for Public Library: Grant to Be Used for Repairs and Improvements at Main Building and Branches". The New York Times. August 22, 1935. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  85. ^ "WPA to Build New Roof For the Public Library". The New York Times. February 19, 1936. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  86. ^ a b c Carmody, Deirdre (December 25, 1981). "Main Library to Revive Unused Exhibition Area". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved July 12, 2022.
  87. ^ a b c Reif, Rita (April 4, 1999). "Art/Architecture: Seeing a Familiar Haunt Again, but in a New Light". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 20, 2018.
  88. ^ a b "New York Public Library restored to grandeur". Press and Sun-Bulletin. Binghamton, NY. Associated Press. September 29, 1998. p. 10. Retrieved December 22, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  89. ^ "War Books Losing Favor At Library: Demand for Such Works Far Less Than That Recorded in 1914 and 1915". The New York Times. March 14, 1940. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  90. ^ "Service Folk Get Room in Library: Special Retreat Is Set Aside Where Men and Women in Uniform May Read". The New York Times. February 11, 1943. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
  91. ^ "Library Additions Planned for City: Central Building to Be Greatly Expanded and New One Put Up in Fifty-Third Street". The New York Times. June 30, 1944. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
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  93. ^ "Ask City to Take Over Public Library Branch". New York Daily News. May 6, 1949. p. 408. Retrieved December 18, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  94. ^ "In the Book Processing Center of the Public Library". The New York Times. November 1, 1949. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
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  97. ^ "Library Renovation Starting". The New York Times. July 20, 1964. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved December 22, 2018.
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Sources

  • Adams, Eric (January 1999). "Study Hall" (PDF). Architecture. Vol. 88. pp. 127–131.
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  • National Register of Historic Inventory - Nomination Form For Federal Properties: The New York Public Library (Report).
March 24, 2023
york, public, library, main, branch, stephen, schwarzman, building, commonly, known, main, branch, 42nd, street, library, york, public, library, flagship, building, york, public, library, system, midtown, manhattan, neighborhood, york, city, branch, four, rese. The Stephen A Schwarzman Building commonly known as the Main Branch 42nd Street Library or the New York Public Library b is the flagship building in the New York Public Library system in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City The branch one of four research libraries in the library system contains nine separate divisions The structure contains four stories open to the public The main entrance steps are at Fifth Avenue at its intersection with East 41st Street As of 2015 update the branch contains an estimated 2 5 million volumes in its stacks a The building was declared a National Historic Landmark a National Register of Historic Places site and a New York City designated landmark in the 1960s Stephen A Schwarzman BuildingMain BranchMain entrance on 5th AvenueCountryUnited StatesTypeResearch libraryEstablishedMay 23 1911 1911 05 23 opened to public ArchitectCarrere and HastingsLocation476 Fifth Avenue Manhattan New York City 10018Branch ofNew York Public LibraryCollectionItems collectedApproximately 2 5 million 2015 update a Websitewww wbr nypl wbr org wbr locations wbr schwarzmanCoordinates40 45 11 N 73 58 55 W 40 75306 N 73 98194 W 40 75306 73 98194 Coordinates 40 45 11 N 73 58 55 W 40 75306 N 73 98194 W 40 75306 73 98194Built1897 1911Architectural style s Beaux ArtsU S National Historic LandmarkDesignatedDecember 21 1965 1 Reference no 66000546U S National Register of Historic PlacesDesignatedOctober 15 1966 2 Reference no 66000546New York City LandmarkDesignatedJanuary 11 1967Reference no 0246Designated entityFacade 3 New York City LandmarkDesignatedNovember 12 1974Reference no 0880Designated entityInterior Astor Hall Stairs and McGraw Rotunda 4 New York City LandmarkDesignatedAugust 8 2017Reference no 2592Designated entityInterior Rose Main Reading Room and Public Catalog Room 5 The Main Branch was built after the New York Public Library was formed as a combination of two libraries in the late 1890s The site along Fifth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Streets is located directly east of Bryant Park on the site of the Croton Reservoir The architectural firm Carrere and Hastings constructed the structure in the Beaux Arts style and the structure opened on May 23 1911 The marble facade of the building contains ornate detailing and the Fifth Avenue entrance is flanked by a pair of stone lions that serve as the library s icon The interior of the building contains the Main Reading Room a space measuring 78 by 297 feet 24 by 91 m with a 52 foot high 16 m ceiling a Public Catalog Room and various reading rooms offices and art exhibitions The Main Branch became popular after its opening and saw 4 million annual visitors by the 1920s It formerly contained a circulating library though the circulating division of the Main Branch moved to the nearby Mid Manhattan Library in 1970 Additional space for the library s stacks was constructed under adjacent Bryant Park in 1991 and the branch s Main Reading Room was restored in 1998 A major restoration from 2007 to 2011 was underwritten by a 100 million gift from philanthropist Stephen A Schwarzman for whom the branch was subsequently renamed The branch underwent another expansion starting in 2018 The Main Branch has been featured in many television shows and films Contents 1 History 1 1 Development 1 1 1 Site and design selection 1 1 2 Construction 1 2 Opening 1 3 20th century growth 1 3 1 1920s and 1930s 1 3 2 1940s to 1970s 1 3 3 1980s and 1990s 1 4 21st century changes 1 4 1 2000s start of renovations 1 4 2 2010s the Central Library Plan and after 2 Divisions 2 1 General Research Division 2 2 Milstein Division of U S History Local History and Genealogy 2 3 Map Division 2 4 Manuscripts and Archives Division 2 5 Dorot Jewish Division 2 6 Berg Collection of English and American Literature 2 7 Pforzheimer Collection of Shelley and His Circle 2 8 Rare Book Division 2 9 Wallach Division of Art Prints and Photographs 3 Exterior 3 1 Fifth Avenue elevation 3 2 Northern and southern elevations 3 3 Bryant Park elevation 4 Interior 4 1 Ground floor 4 2 First floor 4 2 1 Astor Hall 4 2 2 Other spaces 4 3 Second floor 4 4 Third floor 4 4 1 McGraw Rotunda 4 4 2 Rose Main Reading Room 4 4 3 Public Catalog Room 4 4 4 Salomon Room 4 5 Non public stacks 5 Library Way 6 Landmark designations 7 In popular culture 7 1 Film 7 2 Television 7 3 Literature 8 See also 9 References 9 1 Notes 9 2 Citations 9 3 Sources 10 External linksHistory Edit A remnant of the Croton distribution reservoir seen at the foundation of the South Court in 2014 The consolidation of the Astor and Lenox Libraries into the New York Public Library in 1895 9 10 along with a large bequest from Samuel J Tilden and a donation of 5 2 million from Andrew Carnegie 11 allowed for the creation of an enormous library system 12 The libraries had a combined 350 000 items after the merger which was relatively small compared to other library systems at the time 13 14 As a point of civic pride the New York Public Library s founders wanted an imposing main branch 9 15 While the American Museum of Natural History and the Metropolitan Museum of Art s Fifth Avenue branch were both located on prominent sites facing Central Park there was no such site available for a main library building furthermore most of the city s libraries were either private collections or small branch libraries 16 Development Edit Site and design selection Edit Several sites were considered including those of the Astor and Lenox Libraries 17 In March 1896 the trustees of the libraries ultimately chose a new site along Fifth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Streets because it was centrally located between the Astor and Lenox Libraries 13 18 19 At the time it was occupied by the obsolete Croton Reservoir 13 19 remnants of which still exist on the library floor 20 The library s trustees convinced mayor William L Strong to give them the reservoir site after they gave him studies showing that the size of New York City s library collection lagged behind those of many other cities 21 Dr John Shaw Billings who was named the first director of the New York Public Library had created an early sketch for a massive reading room on top of seven floors of book stacks combined with the fastest system for getting books into the hands of those who requested to read them 22 23 His design for the new library though controversial for its time 24 formed the basis of the Main Branch 22 23 Once the Main Branch was opened the Astor and Lenox Libraries were planned to close and their functions were planned to be merged into that of the Main Branch 13 In May 1897 the New York State Legislature passed a bill allowing the site of the Croton Reservoir to be used for a public library building 13 25 The Society of Beaux Arts Architects hosted an architectural design competition for the library with two rounds The rules of the competition s first round were never published but they were used as the basis for later design competitions 26 Entrants submitted 88 designs 27 28 of which 12 were selected for a semi finalist round and six went on to a finalist round 29 28 About a third of the designs 29 in total followed the same design principles outlined in Billings s original sketch Each of the semifinalist designs were required to include specific architectural features including limestone walls a central delivery desk reading rooms with large windows and stacks illuminated by sunlight 28 The six finalists were selected by a jury composed of library trustees and architects The jury relaxed the requirement that the proposals adhere to a specific floor plan after McKim Mead amp White which had received the most votes from the jury nearly withdrew from the competition 30 All of the finalist designs were in the Beaux Arts style 28 Ultimately in November 1897 the relatively unknown firm of Carrere and Hastings was selected to design and construct the new library 31 32 The jury named the firm of Howard amp Cauldwell and McKim Mead amp White as runners up 32 Carrere and Hastings created a model for the future library building which was exhibited at New York City Hall in 1900 33 34 Whether John Mervin Carrere or Thomas S Hastings contributed more to the design is in dispute but both architects are honored with busts located at the bottoms of each of Astor Hall s two staircases 22 In a later interview with The New York Times Carrere stated that the library would contain twenty five or thirty different rooms each with their own specialty eighty three miles of books in its stacks and a general reading room that could fit a thousand guests 35 During the design process Hastings had wanted to shift the library building closer to Sixth Avenue and he also proposed sinking 42nd Street to create a forecourt for the library but both plans were rejected 36 The New York City Board of Estimate approved Carrere and Hastings s plans for the library in December 1897 37 38 Construction Edit Construction was delayed by the objections of mayor Robert Anderson Van Wyck who expressed concerns that the city s finances were unstable 25 39 As a result the planned library was delayed for a year 39 The Board of Estimate authorized a bond measure of 500 000 in May 1899 13 The next month contractor Eugene Lentilhon started excavating the Croton Reservoir 39 40 and workers began digging through the reservoir s 25 foot thick 7 6 m wall 13 After spending seven weeks tunneling through the wall Lentilhon determined that the floor of the reservoir could only be demolished using dynamite 39 Work on the foundation commenced in May 1900 12 41 and much of the Croton Reservoir had been excavated by 1901 13 39 In November 1900 work was hindered by a water main break that partly flooded the old reservoir 42 Norcross Brothers received the general contract 41 34 although this was initially controversial because the firm was not the lowest bidder 43 After a private ceremony to mark the start of construction was held in August 1902 41 a ceremonial cornerstone was laid on November 10 1902 44 39 45 The cornerstone contained a box of artifacts from the library and the city 46 The architects awarded the contract for the library s stacks to Snead amp Company for drainage and plumbing to M J O Brien for interior finishes to the John Peirce Company and for electric equipment to the Lord Electric Company 34 Progress on the marble work c 1903 Front elevation in 1908 the lion statues at the Main Branch had not yet been installed Work progressed gradually on the library the basement was completed by 1903 and the first floor by 1904 41 However exterior work was delayed due to the high cost of securing large amounts of marble as well as frequent labor strikes 34 When the Norcross Brothers contract expired in August 1904 the exterior was only halfway completed 47 During mid 1905 giant columns were put into place and work on the roof was begun the roof was finished by December 1906 12 The remaining contracts totaling 1 2 million concerned the installation of furnishings in the interior 48 The interior and exterior were largely constructed simultaneously 34 The building s exterior was mostly done by the end of 1907 41 34 The pace of construction was generally sluggish in 1906 an official for the New York Public Library stated that some of the exterior and most of the interior was not finished 49 Contractors started painting the main reading room and catalog room in 1908 and began installing furniture the following year 41 Starting in 1910 around 75 miles 121 km worth of shelves were installed to hold the collections that were designated for being housed there with substantial room left for future acquisitions 50 It took one year to transfer and install the books from the Astor and Lenox Libraries 51 Late in the construction process a proposal to install a municipal light plant in the basement of the Main Branch was rejected 52 By late 1910 the library was nearly completed 53 and officials forecast an opening date of May 1911 54 Carrere died before the building was opened and in March 1911 two thousand people viewed his coffin in the library s rotunda 55 Opening Edit On May 23 1911 officials held a ceremony to open the main branch of the New York Public Library U S president William Howard Taft presided over the ceremony whose 15 000 guests included governor John Alden Dix and mayor William Jay Gaynor 56 57 58 The public was invited the following day May 24 59 60 and tens of thousands went to the Library s jewel in the crown 50 The first item called for was Philosophy of the Plays of Shakespeare Unfolded by Delia Bacon although this was a publicity stunt and the book was not in the Main Branch s collection at the time 46 61 The first item actually delivered was N I Grot s Nravstvennye idealy nashego vremeni Ethical Ideas of Our Time a study of Friedrich Nietzsche and Leo Tolstoy The reader filed his slip at 9 08 a m and received his book seven minutes later 46 62 The Beaux Arts Main Branch was the largest marble structure up to that time in the United States 50 with shelf space for 3 5 million volumes spread across 375 000 square feet 34 800 m2 57 The projected final cost was 10 million excluding the cost of the books and the land representing a fourfold increase over the initial cost estimate of 2 5 million 57 63 The structure ultimately cost 9 million to build 64 56 over three times as much as originally projected 62 65 Because there were so many visitors during the first week of the Main Branch s opening the New York Public Library s directors initially did not count the number of visitors but guessed that 250 000 patrons were accommodated during the first week 66 The construction of the Main Branch along with that of the nearby Grand Central Terminal helped to revitalize Bryant Park 41 20th century growth Edit The Main Branch came to be regarded as an architectural landmark As early as 1911 Harper s Monthly magazine praised the architecture of this interesting and important building 44 In 1971 New York Times architectural critic Ada Louise Huxtable wrote As urban planning the library still suits the city remarkably well and praised its gentle monumentality and knowing humanism 67 Architectural historian Kate Lemos wrote in 2006 that the library has held a commanding presence at the bustling corner of 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue as the neighborhood grew up around it 59 The Main Branch also took on importance as a major research center 46 68 Norbert Pearlroth who served as a researcher for the Ripley s Believe It or Not book series perused an estimated 7 000 books annually from 1923 to 1975 68 Other patrons included First Lady of the United States Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis writers Alfred Kazin Norman Mailer Frank McCourt John Updike Cecil Beaton Isaac Bashevis Singer and E L Doctorow actors Helen Hayes Marlene Dietrich Lillian Gish Diana Rigg and Princess Grace Kelly of Monaco playwright Somerset Maugham film producer Francis Ford Coppola journalists Eliezer Ben Yehuda and Tom Wolfe and boxer Joe Frazier 46 The Main Branch was also used for major works and invention Edwin Land conducted research at the building for his later invention the Land Camera while Chester Carlson invented Xerox photocopiers after researching photoconductivity and electrostatics at the library 46 68 During World War II American soldiers decoded a Japanese cipher based on a Mexican phone book whose last remaining copy among Allied nations existed at the Main Branch 68 1920s and 1930s Edit Back elevation 1910s Initially the Main Branch was opened at 1 p m on Sundays and 9 a m on all other days and it closed at 10 p m each day This was to encourage patrons to use the new library 62 69 By 1926 the library was heavily patronized with up to 1 000 people per hour requesting books The library was most used between 10 a m to 12 p m and 3 30 to 5 50 p m and from October through May The most highly requested books were those for economics and American and English literature though during World War I geography books were the most demanded because of the ongoing war 70 It was estimated that 4 million people per year used the Main Branch in 1928 up from 2 million in 1918 71 and 3 million in 1926 72 There were 1 3 million books requested by nearly 600 000 people through call slips in 1927 73 By 1934 though annual patronage held steady at 4 million visitors the Main Branch had 3 61 million volumes in its collection 74 Due to the increased demand for books new shelves were installed in the stockrooms and the cellars by the 1920s to accommodate the expanded stacks However this still proved to be insufficient 73 The New York Public Library announced an expansion of the Main Branch in 1928 71 Thomas Hastings prepared plans for new wings near the north and south sides of the structure which would extend eastward toward Fifth Avenue as well as a storage annex in Bryant Park to the west 73 The expansion was planned to cost 2 million but was never built 75 After Hastings died in 1929 it was revealed that his will contained 100 000 for modifications to the facade with which he had been dissatisfied 76 A theater collection was installed in the Main Reading Room in 1933 77 Two years later the Bryant Park Open Air Reading Room was established operating during the summer The reading room was meant to improve the morale of readers during the Great Depression and it operated until 1943 when it closed down due to a shortage of librarians 78 In 1936 library trustee George F Baker gave the Main Branch forty issues of the New York Gazette from the 18th century which had not been preserved anywhere else 79 In 1937 the doctors Albert and Henry Berg made an offer to the library s trustees to donate their collections of rare English and American literature After Henry died the collection was dedicated in his memory 80 The Berg Reading Room was formally dedicated in October 1940 81 During the 1930s Works Progress Administration WPA workers helped maintain the Main Branch Their tasks included upgrading the heating ventilation and lighting systems refitting the treads on the branch s marble staircases painting the bookshelves walls ceilings and masonry and general upkeep 82 83 The WPA allocated 2 5 million for the building s maintenance 84 In January 1936 it was announced that the Main Branch s roof would be renovated as part of a seven month WPA project 85 1940s to 1970s EditIn 1942 the main exhibition room was converted into office space and partitioned off 86 During World War II the fifteen large windows in the Main Reading Room were blacked out though they were later uncovered 87 In the following years the Main Reading Room became neglected broken lighting fixtures were not replaced and the room s windows were never cleaned 87 88 Unlike during World War I war related books at the Main Branch did not become popular during World War II 89 A room for members of the United States Armed Forces was opened in 1943 90 In 1944 the New York Public Library proposed another expansion plan The stacks capacity would be increased to 3 million books and the circulating library in the Main Branch would be moved to a new 53rd Street Library 91 The circulating library at the Main Branch was ultimately kept for the time being though its single room soon became insufficient to host all of the circulating volumes 92 Subsequently in 1949 the library asked the city to take over responsibility for the Main Branch s circulating and children s libraries 93 As part of the modernization of the Main Branch newly delivered books started being processed in that building rather than at various circulation branch libraries 94 The Mid Manhattan Library which opened in 1970 and replaced the circulating library at the Main Branch The rear of the library s main hall was partitioned off in 1950 creating a bursar s office measuring 42 by 13 ft 12 8 by 4 0 m 95 Minor repairs at the Main Branch occurred during the 1960s The city government allocated money for the installation of fire sprinklers in the main branch s stacks in 1960 96 In 1964 contracts were awarded for the installation of a new floor level above the south corridor on the first floor as well as for replacement of the skylights 97 By the mid 1960s the branch contained 7 million volumes 98 and had outgrown its 88 miles 142 km of stacks 99 100 The circulating facilities at the Main Branch continued to grow and in 1961 the New York Public Library convened a group of six librarians to look for a new facility for the circulating department 92 The library bought the Arnold Constable amp Company department store at 8 East 40th Street at the southeast corner of Fifth Avenue and 40th Street across from the Main Branch 101 The Main Branch s circulating collection was moved to the Mid Manhattan Library in 1970 92 During the 1970s the New York Public Library as a whole experienced financial troubles 102 which were exacerbated by the 1975 New York City fiscal crisis 68 As a cost cutting measure in 1970 the library decided to close the Main Branch during Sundays and holidays 103 The library also closed the Main Branch s science and technology division in late 1971 to save money but private funds allowed the division to reopen in January 1972 104 The lions in front of the Main Branch s main entrance were restored in 1975 105 By the end of the decade the Main Branch was in disrepair and the NYPL trustees were raising money for the research library s continued upkeep 100 106 The NYPL system was so short on funds that the research library was only open 43 hours a week until 1979 when Time Inc and the Grace Krieble Delmas Foundation jointly donated 750 000 to extend the branch s operating hours 106 1980s and 1990s Edit Vartan Gregorian took over as president of the New York Public Library in 1981 100 107 108 At the time many of the Main Branch s interior spaces had been subdivided and extensively modified with offices in many of the spaces 100 108 109 The main exhibition room had been turned into an accounting office the reading room s furniture had metal brackets screwed onto them and there were lights wires and ducts hung throughout the space 109 Gregorian organized events to raise money for the library which helped raise funds for the cleaning of the facade and the renovation of the lobby roof and lighting system 110 Architectural firm Davis Brody amp Associates architect Giorgio Cavaglieri and architectural consultant Arthur Rosenblatt devised a master plan for the library 100 111 Before the master plan was implemented the D S and R H Gottesman Foundation gave 1 25 million in December 1981 for the restoration of the main exhibition room 86 which was redesigned by Davis Brody and Cavaglieri 100 Workers erected a temporary construction fence around the library s terraces in 1982 112 113 As part of a greater renovation of Bryant Park Laurie Olin and Davis Brody redesigned the terraces while Hugh Hardy redesigned the kiosks within the terraces 100 114 Several rooms were restored as part of the plan 113 The first space to be renovated the periodical room was completed in 1983 with a 20 million gift from Reader s Digest editor DeWitt Wallace 115 The exhibition room reopened in May 1984 and was renamed the Gottesman Exhibition Hall 116 117 The Catalog Room was restored starting in 1983 118 119 Ten million catalog cards many of which were tattered were replaced with photocopies that had been created over six years at a cost of 3 3 million 119 120 In addition room 80 was renovated into a lecture hall called the Celeste Bartos Forum in 1987 121 122 Offices were relocated to former storage rooms on the ground level 108 Other divisions were added to the Main Branch during the 1980s such as the Pforzheimer Collection of Shelley and His Circle in 1986 123 and the Wallach Division of Art Prints and Photographs in 1987 124 The terraces on Fifth Avenue reopened in 1988 after they were restored 116 Bryant Park underneath which additional stacks were constructed in the late 1980s Meanwhile the library was adding 150 000 volumes to its collections annually which could not fit within the stacks of the existing building 116 99 In the late 1980s the New York Public Library decided to expand the Main Branch s stacks to the west underneath Bryant Park 46 99 The project was originally estimated to cost 21 6 million and would be the largest expansion project in the Main Branch s history 125 It was approved by the city s Art Commission in January 1987 126 and construction on the stacks started in July 1988 46 The expansion required that Bryant Park be closed to the public and then excavated but because the park had grown dilapidated over the years the stack expansion project was seen as an opportunity to rebuild the park 125 The library added more than 120 000 square feet 11 000 m2 of storage space and 84 miles 135 km of bookshelves under Bryant Park doubling the length of the stacks in the Main Branch 116 99 The space could accommodate 3 2 million books and a half million reels of microfilm 116 The new stacks were connected to the Main Branch via a tunnel measuring 62 ft 19 m 116 or 120 ft 37 m long 46 Once the underground facilities were completed Bryant Park was completely rebuilt 127 with 2 5 or 6 feet 0 76 or 1 83 m of earth between the park surface and the storage facility s ceiling 46 128 The extension was opened in September 1991 at a cost of 24 million 46 however it only included one of two planned levels of stacks 129 Bryant Park was reopened in mid 1992 after a three year renovation 128 The Catalog Room was renamed in 1994 for fashion designer Bill Blass who gave 10 million to the NYPL 118 130 The Main Reading Room was closed in July 1997 for renovations 131 designed by Davis Brody Bond 132 133 The restoration entailed cleaning and repainting the ceiling cleaning the windows refinishing the wood and removing partitions within the room 88 118 134 Workers also replaced desk lamps and installed energy efficient window panes 135 136 The space was renamed the Rose Main Reading Room after the children of a benefactor who had given 15 million toward the renovation 87 The Reading Room reopened on November 16 1998 137 133 The same year the New York State government allocated funding for the Main Branch to install computers and other electronic devices 138 The Reading Room received new workstations and the space was also redecorated to accommodate patrons laptops 139 The bungalow in the Library s South Court was taken apart the same year 46 140 21st century changes Edit 2000s start of renovations Edit A four story glass structure was erected on the site of the South Court an enclosed courtyard on the Main Branch s south side starting in the late 1990s The structure cost 22 2 million and included a floor area of 42 220 square feet 3 922 m2 141 Opened in 2002 the South Court structure was the first permanent above ground addition to the Main Branch since its opening 46 The pop up reading room in Bryant Park was re established in summer 2003 The room contained 700 books and 300 periodicals 78 By 2004 streaks were already blackening the white marble and pollution and moisture were corroding the ornamental statuary According to The New York Times tiny particles of rubber scattered by passing car tires have accumulated on the building mixing gradually with water to turn the marble into gypsum which causes the outer layer to crumble in a sugaring effect In December 2005 the Lionel Pincus and Princess Firyal Map Division space with richly carved wood marble and metalwork was restored 142 Restoration work on the building s facade 2008 Plaque honoring Stephen A Schwarzman s contributions In 2007 the library announced that it would undertake a three year 50 million renovation of the building exterior which had suffered damage from weathering and automobile exhaust The marble structure and its sculptural elements were to be cleaned three thousand cracks were to be repaired and various components would be restored All of the work was scheduled to be completed by the centennial in 2011 143 Library director Paul LeClerc said in 2007 that my ambition is for this to be the building you simply must see in New York at nighttime because it is so beautiful and it is so important By late 2007 library officials had not yet decided whether to try to restore damaged sculptural elements or just clean and stabilize them Cleaning would be done either with lasers or by applying poultices and peeling them off 142 Stephen A Schwarzman donated 100 million toward the renovation and expansion of the building and in April 2008 the library announced that the main branch building would be renamed in his honor As a condition of the gift Schwarzman s name would be displayed at each public entrance 144 145 Later that year British architect Norman Foster was chosen to design the Main Branch s renovation To pay for the renovations the New York Public Library was attempting to sell the Mid Manhattan and Donnell branches the latter of which had already found a buyer 146 Nicolai Ouroussoff former architecture critic for The New York Times opined that Foster s selection was one of a string of shrewd decisions by the library that should put our minds at ease 147 2010s the Central Library Plan and after Edit By 2010 while renovations on the Main Branch were ongoing the New York Public Library had cut back its staff and budget in other branches following the Great Recession of 2008 148 149 In 2012 a Central Library Plan was announced in which the nearby Mid Manhattan Library and Science Industry and Business Library would be closed and that the Main Branch would be turned into a circulating library 150 151 As part of the plan over a million books would have been put into storage in the Research Collections and Preservation Consortium ReCAP warehouse in New Jersey shared with Princeton University and Columbia University 149 Although some critics praised the plan as a move that would allow visitors to make greater use of the Main Branch s research facilities 152 153 a majority spoke out against it 154 155 156 with one editorial deriding it as cultural vandalism 157 Academics writers architects and civic leaders signed a letter of protest against the plan 158 and Princeton history professor Anthony Grafton wrote that readers who want to consult a book will often have to order it in advance and may find as readers sometimes do here that real delivery times are slower than advertised ones 159 After a protracted six year battle and two public interest lawsuits the Central Library Plan was abandoned in May 2014 due to pressure by its opponents and the election of Bill de Blasio as mayor 160 161 Subsequently an 8 million gift from Abby and Howard Milstein helped fund the renovation of the second level of stacks beneath Bryant Park so that they could be used to store the books 129 The controversy was damaging to the reputation of not only the library s board but of its president Anthony Marx In a book about the drawn out often secretive initiatives to sell real estate and remove the heart of a treasured landmark Scott Sherman concluded that Marx and his wealthy supporters lacked prudence they applied radical free market solutions to complex institutional problems In the end elected officials in New York City had to save the NYPL from its own trustees 162 In May 2014 one of the gilded plaster rosettes in the ceiling of the Rose Main Reading Room fell to the floor 163 The NYPL closed the Rose Main Reading Room and the Public Catalog Room for renovations The 12 million restoration project included restoring the rosettes and supporting them with steel cables as well as installing LED lamp fixtures 164 The NYPL commissioned EverGreene Architectural Arts to recreate the mural in the Bill Blass Public Catalog Room which had suffered irreparable discoloration overpainting and water damage during its 105 year history 165 The NYPL also replaced its historic chain and lift book conveyor system with a new delivery system using book trains 129 The restored Rose Main Reading Room and Bill Blass Public Catalog Room reopened on October 5 2016 166 167 Starting in August 2017 the Main Branch temporarily hosted an interim circulating library at 42nd Street 168 The interim library was to hold part of the collection of the Mid Manhattan Library while the Mid Manhattan building was closed for renovations which were scheduled to be completed in 2020 169 The Mid Manhattan Branch s collection of pictures was also temporarily relocated to the Main Branch 170 until the circulating library reopened in 2020 171 172 In November 2017 the New York Public Library board approved a 317 million master plan for the Main Branch which would be the largest renovation in the branch s history The plan designed by architecture firms Mecanoo and Beyer Blinder Belle would increase publicly available space by 20 percent add a new entrance at 40th Street create the Center for Research and Learning for high school and college students add elevator banks and expand space for exhibitions and researchers 173 174 At the time of approval 308 million of funds had been raised and construction was expected to be completed in 2021 175 The renovations began in July 2018 with the start of construction on the Lenox and Astor Room a scholar s center on the second floor 176 177 The Landmarks Preservation Commission approved the 40th Street entrance with minor modifications in March 2019 145 That August the NYPL announced that the lions outside the Main Branch s front entrance would be restored in September and October at a cost of 250 000 178 179 Divisions EditThere are nine divisions at the New York Public Library s Main Branch of which eight are special collections 180 General Research Division Edit The General Research Division is the main division of the Main Branch and the only one that is not a special collection The division is based out of the Rose Main Reading Room and the Bill Blass Public Catalog Room The division contains 43 million items in more than 430 languages 181 Milstein Division of U S History Local History and Genealogy Edit The Irma and Paul Milstein Division of U S History Local History and Genealogy houses one of the largest publicly available genealogical collections in North America Though the division contains many New York City related documents it also contains documents collected from towns cities counties and states across the U S as well as genealogies from around the world 182 The division acquired the holdings of the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society in 2008 183 184 Map Division Edit The ornate wooden cornice of the Map Division The Lionel Pincus and Princess Firyal Map Division was created in 1898 It contains more than 20 000 atlases and 433 000 sheet maps dating to as early as the 16th century The collection includes maps on local regional national and global scales as well as city maps topographic maps and maps in antiquarian and digitized formats 185 Manuscripts and Archives Division Edit The Manuscripts and Archives Division comprises over 5 500 collections These include 700 cuneiform tablets 160 illuminated manuscripts from the Middle Ages and Renaissance periods notable people s and entities papers publishing archives social and economics collections and papers about the New York Public Library s history 186 The division supplements similar divisions at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem and the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center 186 Dorot Jewish Division Edit The Dorot Jewish Division contains documents about Jewish subjects and the Hebrew language The division founded in 1897 contains documents and books from the Astor and Lenox Libraries the Aguilar Free Library and the private collections of Leon Mandelstamm Meyer Lehren and Isaac Meyer The division is named for the Dorot Foundation who made a formal endowment for the Chief of Division in 1986 187 Berg Collection of English and American Literature Edit The Henry W and Albert A Berg Collection of English and American Literature contains rare books first editions and manuscripts in English and American literature The collection includes over 35 000 works from 400 individual authors 80 The collection was created in 1940 with a donation from Albert Berg in memory of his brother Henry 81 and was formally endowed in 1941 80 The initial collection comprised 3 500 books and pamphlets created by over 100 authors 188 80 An additional 15 000 works came from Owen D Young who donated his private collection to the library in 1941 80 189 Pforzheimer Collection of Shelley and His Circle Edit The Carl H Pforzheimer Collection of Shelley and His Circle is a collection of around 25 000 works from the English Romanticism genre created in the 18th and 19th centuries It was donated by the estate of oil financier Carl Pforzheimer in 1986 According to the New York Public Library s website the collection contains works from English Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley Shelley s second wife Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley and her family members including William Godwin Mary Wollstonecraft and Claire Clairmont and other contemporaries including Lord Byron Teresa Guiccioli Thomas Jefferson Hogg Leigh Hunt Thomas Love Peacock Horace Smith and Edward John Trelawny 123 Rare Book Division Edit The Main Branch holds the Lenox Copy of the Gutenberg Bible the first copy to be acquired by a United States citizen 190 The Rare Book Division requires pre registration for researchers before they are allowed to enter The collection includes 800 incunable works published in Europe before 1501 Americana published before 1801 and American newspapers published before 1865 as well as over 20 000 broadsides old atlases and works about voyages The division also contains rare Bibles including the first Gutenberg Bible to be brought to the U S the first Native American language Bible and the first Bible created in the U S In addition it includes first editions and copies from notable writers including William Shakespeare copies of The Pilgrim s Progress printed before 1700 Voltaire s entire work and Walt Whitman s personal copies of his own work The division houses rare artifacts as well such as the first book printed in North America and the first English language book printed in the U S 191 Wallach Division of Art Prints and Photographs Edit The Miriam and Ira D Wallach Division of Art Prints and Photographs was created by a gift of the Wallach family in 1987 The collection includes over one million works of art as well as 700 000 monographs and periodicals 124 Exterior EditThe New York Public Library s Main Branch measures 390 feet 120 m on its north south axis by 270 feet 82 m on its west east axis 44 62 142 The library is located on the east side of the block bounded by Fifth Avenue on the east 40th Street on the south Sixth Avenue on the west and 42nd Street on the east 192 The north end of the building sits above entrances to the Fifth Avenue station of the New York City Subway serving the 7 and lt 7 gt trains 193 The station was built as part of the Interborough Rapid Transit Company s Flushing Line 194 and was opened in 1926 with a ceremony at the Main Branch 195 The marble on the library building is about three feet thick and the structure is composed entirely of Vermont marble and brick 142 Most of the exterior of the building is made of white Vermont marble which includes both perpendicular and parallel cuts The lowest section of the walls is made of granite and there are also bronze windows doors grilles and fixtures Tennessee marble was used for the library s flagpole pedestals seats and lion sculptures 196 During construction the builders conducted quality checks on the marble and 65 percent of the marble quarried for the Main Branch was rejected and used in other buildings such as Harvard Medical School 46 The exterior is composed of 20 000 blocks of stone each of which is numbered 142 An elaborate cornice with sculpted figures wraps around the top of the structure s exterior 64 The massing of the library building was intended to highlight its primary public spaces There is a gable roof above the public catalog room which is on axis with the main entrance on Fifth Avenue as well as a hip roof above the main reading room which runs north south near the western end of the building 197 Fifth Avenue elevation Edit One of the lions at the main entrance to the New York Public Library The Main Branch faces Fifth Avenue to the east 64 this comprises the primary elevation of the building 198 A terrace wraps along the Fifth Avenue elevation 64 199 The terrace is 90 feet 27 m deep and contains a granite balustrade 198 The present design of the terrace dates to 1988 when it was resurfaced with granite bluestone and cobblestones The terrace contains movable chairs and tables Along the eastern edge of the terrace are two rows of Japanese locust trees 116 The Fifth Avenue entrance is reached by a grand marble stairway extending west from the terrace at 41st Street 64 Two lion sculptures made of Tennessee marble and sculpted by the Piccirilli Brothers based on a design by Edward Clark Potter flank the stairway from 41st Street 199 200 36 According to one legend the lions flank the steps so patrons could read between the lions 201 They are a trademark of the New York Public Library which uses a single stone lion as its logo 200 Their original names Leo Astor and Leo Lenox in honor of the library s founders were transformed into Lord Astor and Lady Lenox although both lions are male and in the 1930s they were nicknamed Patience and Fortitude by Mayor Fiorello La Guardia who chose the names because he felt that the citizens of New York would need to possess these qualities to see themselves through the Great Depression Patience is on the south side to the left of the entrance stairway and Fortitude on the north to the right 200 36 The lions were restored in 1975 105 and in 2007 2011 200 and they were restored once again in late 2019 178 179 The Fifth Avenue pavilion consists of a portico with six Corinthian columns and three archways 64 199 The Corinthian columns are placed on pedestals with rosettes and Greek fret molding These columns support a marble attic with six 11 foot high 3 4 m allegorical sculptures designed by Paul Wayland Bartlett the figures flank three carved plaques one each for the Astor Lenox and Tilden foundations 198 The arches contain barrel vaults with the faces of the classical deities Juno Minerva and Mercury on their keystones The faces initially all depicted Minerva but Carrere and Hastings hired sculptor Francis Tonetti Dozzi in 1909 to redo the outer two keystones 198 202 The archways lead to the first floor of the structure which is one story above ground level 203 The arches contain bronze doors with marble frames and triangular pediments 198 Hastings had drawn up a new design for the portico in 1921 but this was never constructed 204 George Grey Barnard also designed pediments for sculptures to be installed above the main entrance representing Life and Painting and Sculpture 205 When the sculptures were erected in 1915 he unsuccessfully sued the installers for 50 000 because they did not fit with his vision 206 On either side of the Fifth Avenue entrance pavilion there are alcoves with sculptures of figures inside them followed by five bays of windows 64 198 Each bay contains arched windows on the first floor and rectangular windows on the second floor above which is an attic with a marble balustrade 207 According to architecture critic Henry Hope Reed Jr the balustrade is similar to that at Versailles s Grand Trianon 207 208 The bays are separated by Corinthian columns 207 The alcoves on the Fifth Avenue facade contained figures sculpted by Frederic MacMonnies representing beauty and wisdom 44 204 These figures sit above small fountains inside the alcoves 209 They were shut off from 1942 and 1957 210 and again from the 1980s to 2015 209 The outer ends of the facade are treated as end pavilions 198 Barnard designed pediments for the end pavilions which represented the arts and history they are slightly asymmetrical and resemble the pediment above the main entrance The corner pavilions also contain rusticated quoins as well as stone piers 211 Northern and southern elevations Edit One of two bronze flagpole bases at the 42nd Street entrance sculpted by Raffaele Menconi The northern and southern facades of the building are located along 42nd and 40th Streets respectively The northern and southern elevations were treated as side elevations and the windows on these elevations illuminate secondary spaces inside the library 212 Both elevations measure 11 bays wide and are nearly identical to each other 213 Cornices run above the northern and southern elevations connecting the primary elevations on Fifth Avenue and Bryant Park 212 The northern side contains an entrance to the ground level while the southern side was not built with a public entrance 203 213 The northern entrance is at the center of that elevation and is topped by a pediment 213 The northern entrance is flanked by flagpoles whose sculpted bronze bases were designed in 1912 by Thomas Hastings They were realized by the sculptor Raffaele Menconi who often worked closely with New York architects of the Beaux Arts generation 214 Each of the bronze bases is supported by four tortoises and contains cast bronze ornament in addition to personifications of conquest civilization discovery and navigation 215 The bronzes were cast at Tiffany Studios in Long Island City 214 215 They are dedicated to New York s former Reform mayor John Purroy Mitchell 215 216 The building contained an enclosed courtyard on its south side called the South Court measuring 80 by 80 feet 24 by 24 m It was originally a drop off location for horse carriages 141 The court contained a marble fountain and horse trough with a bungalow erected in 1919 as an employees break area The fountain was destroyed in 1950 and replaced with a parking lot and the bungalow was taken apart in 1998 46 140 133 A six story glass structure was erected on the site of the South Court opening in 2002 133 217 The current structure measures 73 by 73 feet 22 by 22 m and is connected to the rest of the library building via glass bridges 133 141 Below the South Court structure is a 174 seat auditorium accessed via a glass staircase cut into the original basement 133 217 The first story contains the Bartos Education Center with two classrooms and an orientation theater The second through fourth floors contain offices and the fourth floor also contains a quiet room and staff lounge 217 Bryant Park elevation Edit The library s west side bottom left faces Bryant Park The west side which faces Bryant Park contains narrow vertical windows that illuminate the stacks inside the Main Branch 64 218 The narrow windows allow light to enter the stacks below the third floor Rose Main Reading Room Above the tall windows near the top of the facade are nine large arched windows that illuminate the reading room itself 62 218 The presence of the narrow windows may have been intended to evoke the appearance of a flat colonnade 213 Next to the center of the facade is a statue of William Cullen Bryant sculpted by Herbert Adams the statue is placed on a plinth and sheltered by a half dome supported by Doric columns 219 220 Near the top of the facade are eight doorways with pediments which were part of the original design 221 222 Although NYPL staff were unable to ascertain why these doorways were built 222 they may have been built in anticipation of an unbuilt expansion of the stacks toward Bryant Park 221 There is a projecting cornice and a hip roof above the center section of the stacks and reading room The northern and southern ends of the Bryant Park elevation both contain pavilions similar to those on Fifth Avenue 223 Interior EditThe interior of the Main Branch consists of four publicly accessible floors the ground level and the first through third floors 203 There is a corridor along the eastern side of each floor which runs the length of the building from north to south 199 224 The building also contains two light courts measuring three by three bays wide which separate each floor into four bay wide sections to the west and east 224 Originally the interior collectively contained more than 200 rooms and the building had a footprint of 115 000 square feet 10 700 m2 44 Generally lower room numbers are located on the south side of the building and higher room numbers on the north side 203 225 Many spaces contain quarry tile floors walls with shelves or wood paneling and molded plaster ceilings 226 The interior contains ornate detail from Carrere and Hastings such as motifs of lions 36 and the decorative scheme extended to such minute details as doorknobs and wastebaskets 46 There is a pair of public stairways on the north side of the building which lead between the ground and third floors The stairs share landings in the middle of each flight allowing visitors to switch between staircases 203 227 The stairways contain vaulted ceilings made of Vermont marble they are separated by solid marble floors except at the landings where there are square archways These stairways may have been influenced by the design of the Louvre s Henry II Wing 227 The cellar which is not open to the public was initially used as a mechanical plant 199 and contains remnants of the original Croton Reservoir 20 199 The western side of the building from the cellar to the second floor contains part of the Main Branch s storage stacks Supplementing the Main Reading Room on the third floor there are 21 other reading rooms in the Main Branch including a ground floor room with a cast iron ceiling 199 There were originally 1 760 seats in all of the reading rooms combined of which 768 were located in the Main Reading Room 228 Ground floor Edit Detailing in the Public Catalog Room The ground floor contains the entrance to 42nd Street 203 Originally it contained a coat check circulating library newspaper room and children s book room There were also spaces for telephones a library school office and a travelling library office 69 The former newspaper room in room 78 became the children s book room and the former children s book room in room 81 is not open to the public 69 203 Room 80 operated as the circulating library from 1911 to 1981 121 It measures 80 by 80 feet 24 by 24 m across 121 122 The room is placed at the center of the building but its ground floor location indicates that the library s trustees did not see the circulating library as an important part of the building s plan 229 The glass ceiling measures 30 feet 9 1 m tall and is supported by four iron arches it was covered by a dropped ceiling for much of the mid 20th century Since 1987 room 80 has been the Bartos Forum a 400 seat lecture room 121 122 Most of the Bartos Forum s original design remains in place but the floors have been covered with carpets and the perimeter skylights have been sealed 139 First floor Edit Above the ground floor is the first floor The staircase entrance from Fifth Avenue opens up into the first floor lobby known as Astor Hall 62 230 This floor contains the Picture Collection room 100 Wallace Periodical Room room 108 and Jewish Division room 111 former Periodicals Room on the south side On the north side are the Milstein Division room 121 former Patents Room Milstein Microforms room 119 and Map Division room 117 The Wachenheim Gallery the library shop the Bartos Education Center and the Gottesman Hall room 111 former Exhibition Room are located in rooms that open into Astor Hall 203 230 The first floor also formerly contained various supervisors offices a library for the blind and a technology room 230 The north south corridor extends the entire width of the first floor with large windows overlooking the street at either end the ceiling was painted to resemble carved wood 231 Astor Hall Edit Astor Hall on the first floor Astor Hall is the first floor lobby 62 203 232 reached from the portico at the top of the Fifth Avenue stairs 64 199 232 The hall measures 70 by 44 feet 21 by 13 m 232 corresponding to three north south bays and two west east bays 224 The walls and ceiling are clad in Vermont marble 224 The ceiling is a 34 foot high 10 m shallow barrel vault 232 decorated with rectangular molded frames that consist of various motifs Although the ceiling was intended to be a self supporting structure it is reinforced by a layer of concrete below the second floor 224 The pillars on the west and east walls are topped by egg and dart moldings and there are marble candelabras next to these walls 224 There are arched openings at the top of the western wall which support the ceiling underneath which are archways leading to the first floor rooms 232 233 The north and south walls contain piers 234 The names of major donors are inscribed on the pillars 156 There are two grand marble staircases on the north and south walls 62 224 233 The staircases ascend several steps away from the hall before turning 90 degrees westward at a landing and ascending parallel to each other toward the second floor behind the piers on the north and south walls 232 234 There are bronze busts of Carrere and Hastings created in 1940 and 1935 respectively at the landings of the stairways The Carrere bust is near the south left stair while the Hastings bust is near the north right stair 22 232 At the second floor a mezzanine level overlooks the west side of the lobby behind the arches 108 234 Another pair of staircases continues to the McGraw Rotunda on the third floor 235 236 Each staircase passes through another landing which has a domed ceiling and a hanging chandelier 236 Other spaces Edit Interior of the Wallace Periodical RoomThe Wallace Periodical Room in room 108 has been named for Reader s Digest founder DeWitt Wallace since 1983 115 237 It consists of current issues from 200 periodicals and 22 newspapers 237 The current design of the room dates from a renovation in the 1980s 238 The Periodical Room contains 13 murals of scenes from the history of New York City which were designed by Richard Haas 115 239 The original design included cast iron radiators 238 which were replaced with an air circulation system under the windows 239 In addition the room contains bronze chandeliers and sculptured ceilings 239 Behind Astor Hall s information desk is the Gottesman Exhibition Hall It served as the Main Branch s primary display area from 1911 to 1942 and was subsequently divided into offices 86 The space reopened in 1984 117 The Gottesman Exhibition Hall is made of Vermont marble 240 241 and is accessed by large bronze or wrought iron doors 241 242 The room measures 83 by 77 feet 25 by 23 m across and 18 feet 5 5 m high The room contains Vermont marble pilasters and columns as well as bronze and leaded glass chandeliers hanging from a carved oak ceiling 240 242 The ceiling largely contains sunken panels with various Renaissance style decorations but the outer section of the ceiling has octagonal coffers 242 243 The floor includes a grid of circles and rhombuses 242 Second floor Edit The second floor contains the Jill Kupin Rose Gallery 203 which contains ongoing exhibitions 244 This floor contains several small rooms extending to the north west and south 203 One of these is the Wachenheim Trustees Room which contains wood paneling parquet floors and a fireplace made of white marble 199 245 Originally this level contained director s and assistant director s offices the Slavonic Jewish and Oriental Collections and rooms for science economics and sociology and public documents 246 The former science room at room 225 is now the Cullman Center while room 228 the former economics and sociology room has been split into two rooms 203 246 As on the first floor the second floor s north south corridor extends the entire width of the floor but the ceiling was made of plaster to save money 231 Third floor Edit The McGraw Rotunda is on the east side of the building s third floor 203 The Print Gallery extends south from the rotunda one publicly accessible room the Wallach Division is adjacent to the gallery Similarly the Stokes Gallery extends northward with the Berg and Pforzheimer Collections branching off of it 203 The Salomon Room branches off the McGraw Rotunda to the east To the west is the Bill Blass Public Catalog Room which leads into the large Rose Main Reading Room 203 Unlike on the first and second stories the main north south corridor does not span the entire length of the third floor as there are offices on either end 224 McGraw Rotunda Edit The McGraw Rotunda contains numerous murals by Edward Laning Laning s ceiling mural depicts Prometheus The McGraw Rotunda formerly Central Hall despite its name is a rectangular barrel vaulted space 235 236 The rotunda measures three bays wide from north to south and two bays wide from west to east On the north and south walls the western bay is occupied by the main corridor while the eastern bay contains stairs from Astor Hall 236 The Public Catalog Room is to the west and the Salomon Room is to the east 203 235 The entrances to both rooms are flanked by freestanding marble pedestals 240 the Salomon Room also contains a pair of bronze double doors with carved panels 247 The floors are made of Hauteville and Gray Siena marble 240 The rotunda s walls contain red marble bases with dark wood piers topped by a Corinthian entablature with dentils and modillions 235 236 240 The piers support a plaster 235 or stucco barrel vault 240 On the north and south ends of the barrel vault are glazed semicircular windows 236 240 There are alcoves on the side walls supported by columns with Corinthian capitals which were intended to contain murals 235 The rotunda contains a set of panels painted by Edward Laning in the early 1940s as part of a WPA project The work includes four large panels two lunettes above doorways to the Public Catalog and Salomon Rooms and a ceiling mural painted on the barrel vault The four panels are located on the east and west walls and depict the development of the written word The lunette above the Public Catalog Room s doorway is Learning to Read and the lunette about the Salomon Room s doorway is The Student 235 248 The ceiling mural is called Prometheus Bringing Fire to Men 235 The four panels and two lunettes were completed in 1940 248 and the ceiling mural was completed in 1942 235 Rose Main Reading Room Edit The Main Branch s Deborah Jonathan F P Samuel Priest and Adam R Rose Main Reading Room officially Room 315 and commonly known as the Rose Main Reading Room is located on the third floor of the Main Branch 203 The room is 78 by 297 feet 24 by 91 m with a ceiling measuring about 52 feet high 236 62 139 132 Characterized by Robert A M Stern as one of the United States largest column free rooms 139 it is nearly as large as the Main Concourse at Grand Central Terminal 62 It was originally described as being in the Renaissance architectural style 53 249 but Matthew Postal described the room as having a Beaux Arts design 118 Half of the space was used as an office and service center prior to the late 1990s 132 The Main Reading Room was renovated and renamed for the Rose family in 1998 1999 118 137 250 and further renovations to its ceiling were completed in 2016 250 167 The room became a New York City designated landmark in 2017 251 The room is separated into two sections of equal size by a book delivery desk 252 253 The desk is made of oak and is covered by a canopy 254 with arches held up by Tuscan columns 252 253 The north hall leads to the Manuscripts and Archives Reading Room while the south hall leads to the Art and Architecture Reading Room both of which are designed in a similar style to the main room 62 255 Picture taking is only allowed in a small section of the south hall 62 The doorways into the Main Reading Room contain large round pediments which contrast with the smaller triangular pediments in the branch s other reading rooms 256 There is intricate detail on the room s smaller metalwork such as doorknobs and hinges 249 The floors of the Main Reading Room and the connected Catalog Room are composed of red tiles with marble pavers set in between the tiles which indicate how the furniture should be arranged 256 The marble pavers demarcate the boundaries of the aisles 249 The Rose Main Reading Room facing south The Main Reading Room is furnished with low wooden tables and chairs 249 257 There are two arrays of tables in each hall separated by a wide aisle each table has four brass lamps 249 The tables each measure 23 by 4 feet 7 0 by 1 2 m 258 Originally there were 768 seats 259 but this was reduced to 490 in the late 20th century 132 The seating capacity has since been increased to 624 249 or 636 132 Each spot at each table is assigned a number The room is also equipped with desktop computers providing access to library collections and the Internet as well as docking facilities for laptops 50 258 The NYPL installed 48 desktop computers near the central book delivery desk Thirty of the room s forty two wooden tables have power outlets while twelve of the tables have no outlets and are intended only for reading 258 Readers may fill out forms requesting books brought to them from the library s closed stacks which are delivered to the indicated seat numbers 50 Surrounding the room are thousands of reference works on open shelves along the room s main and balcony levels which may be read openly 199 252 At the time of the library s opening there were about 25 000 freely accessible reference works on the shelves 228 There are three levels of bookshelves two on the main floor beneath the balcony and one on the balcony 252 Above the top level of shelves is a duct carrying wiring and cables for the room 258 The ornate decorated ceiling of the Rose Main Reading Room The walls are made of Caen stone and are designed to resemble limestone 260 Massive windows and grand chandeliers illuminate the space 252 257 261 There are eighteen grand archways of which fifteen contain windows nine face Bryant Park to the west and six face east The other three archways form a wall with the Public Catalog Room to its east and the middle archway also contains windows that face into the Catalog Room 252 257 Each window contains low emissivity glass 136 There are two rows of nine chandeliers in the Main Reading Room 261 decorated with such details as satyr masks and acanthus leaves 257 These were originally fitted with incandescent light bulbs an innovation at the time of the library s opening and were powered by the library s own power plant 261 The lights on the chandeliers are arranged like an inverted cone with four tiers of light bulbs 252 The plaster ceiling is supported on wire mesh since there are no columns within the room 262 The ceiling is painted to emulate gilded wood with moldings of classical and figurative details 263 The Klee Thomson Company plastered the ceiling 264 According to Matthew Postal the moldings include scroll cartouches bordered by cherubs nude female figures with wings cherub heads satyr masks vases of fruit foliate moldings and disguised ventilation grilles 263 The moldings frame a three part mural created by James Wall Finn and completed in 1911 140 265 Though no clear photographs exist of the mural s original appearance the mural in its present incarnation depicts clouds and sky 263 When the ceiling was restored in 1998 the original mural was deemed to be unsalvageable and Yohannes Aynalem instead painted a reproduction 136 140 266 The ceiling was restored again from 2014 to 2016 167 Heating and ventilation grilles are embedded within the walls and ceiling 257 Public Catalog Room Edit The entrance to the Bill Blass Public Catalog Room bottom left through the McGraw Rotunda The Bill Blass Public Catalog Room also located in Room 315 connects the McGraw Rotunda and the Main Reading Room 203 236 its central location makes it a de facto foyer for the reading room 256 The room measures 81 by 77 feet 25 by 23 m 62 Similar to the Main Reading Room it has a 52 foot high ceiling 17 Four chandeliers of identical design to those in the Main Reading Room hang from the ceiling 252 The ceiling of the Public Catalog Room also contains a 27 by 33 foot 8 2 by 10 1 m section of James Wall Finn s 1911 mural 265 The building s light courts abut the room s northern and southern walls 236 The first renovation of the Catalog Room may have taken place in 1935 118 when its ceiling was repainted 83 Further modifications occurred in 1952 when metal cabinets replaced the original oak cabinets as a result of the catalog room s quick expansion with 150 000 new catalog cards being added each year 118 267 The Catalog Room was restored in 1983 119 and renamed for Bill Blass in 1994 130 Computers were added following the 1980s expansion 268 There is an information desk on the north side on the room to the right when entering from the rotunda 256 236 Originally visitors would receive card slips with numbers on them and then be directed to one of the Main Reading Room s halves based on their card number 259 256 The Public Catalog Room also contains waist high oak desks on the south side 249 236 These desks contain computers that allow New York Public Library cardholders to search the library s catalog 269 Salomon Room Edit The Salomon Room The Edna Barnes Salomon Room located east of the McGraw Rotunda in Room 316 203 is usually utilized as an event space 270 It has wooden tables glass exhibit cases and a coved ceiling with a skylight 247 The 4 500 square foot 420 m2 space was originally intended as a picture gallery and oil paintings still hang on the walls In 2009 it was converted to a wireless Internet reading and study room to provide overflow capacity for internet users who cannot fit in the Main Reading Room 271 Non public stacks Edit The stacks within the Schwarzman Building are a main feature of the building Housed beneath the Rose Main Reading Room are a series of stacks which hold an estimated 2 5 million books a At the time of the branch s opening the stacks could hold 2 7 million books on 63 3 miles 101 9 km of shelves 44 228 There were another 500 000 228 or 800 000 books stored in various reading rooms 44 The central stacks as they are called have a capacity of 3 5 million books 8 across 88 miles of bookshelves 99 spanning seven stories 255 129 The stacks contain marble floors as well as iron shelves that are set back from the windows facing Bryant Park 255 As of 2015 update the Main Branch hosts 300 000 books in various reading rooms though there are none in the central stacks themselves due to the deteriorated condition of the stacks 8 There were proposals to demolish the central stacks to make room for the Mid Manhattan Branch as part of the unrealized Central Library Plan in the early 2010s 272 As of 2019 update the library s trustees have still not determined how to use the abandoned stacks in the main building 273 c Another 84 miles of stacks under Bryant Park was added in an expansion between 1987 and 1991 46 99 The Bryant Park stacks comprise two levels of climate controlled storage areas 129 The stacks under Bryant Park contain 1 2 million books on what is called Level 1 8 which was completed in the 1991 expansion A second level of stacks below it Level 2 had not been finished when the 1991 expansion was opened 129 Another 2 5 million books were being moved from the NYPL s ReCAP warehouse in New Jersey to Level 2 as of 2015 update and when that was finished the number of books in the Main Branch s stacks would rise to four million 8 The Level 2 stacks are called the Milstein Stacks after a major donor 129 and opened in January 2017 274 As of 2017 update the stacks also contain about 400 000 circulating volumes that are usually housed in the Mid Manhattan Branch which was closed for renovations until 2020 272 Books are delivered from the Bryant Park stacks to the reading rooms on the first through third floors using the book train The 2 6 million book delivery system was installed in 2016 It contains a conveyor belt and 24 small red carts emblazoned with the library s lion logo which each carry up to 30 pounds 14 kg of books between the stacks and the reading rooms Each cart moves 75 feet 23 m per minute and use gears to climb steep or vertical grades 129 275 Prior to the installation of the book train a Ferris wheel style conveyor system was installed in the 1990s 258 it took ten minutes to retrieve a book using the old system 276 The Ferris wheel system which was complemented by a dumbwaiter itself replaced a 1920s era book delivery system and a 1960s era dumbwaiter 258 The new book delivery system was described as being twice as fast as the old system 129 Library Way EditLeading up to the Main Branch on 41st Street between Park and Fifth Avenues is a series of plaques known as Library Way Library Way comprises a series of illustrated bronze sidewalk plaques featuring quotes from famous authors poets and other notables It features 48 unique plaques in all but each plaque is duplicated along the north and the south sides of 41st Street thus totaling 96 plaques 277 According to The Wall Street Journal a panel composed of the Grand Central Partnership which manages the Grand Central Business Improvement District and the New Yorker magazine chose the quotes in the 1990s while Gregg LeFevre designed the plaques 278 279 Each plaque measures 2 5 feet 0 76 m wide and 1 5 feet 0 46 m long originally there were 98 such plaques The first three by Francis Bacon Emily Dickinson and Virginia Woolf were installed in front of 18 East 41st Street in 2002 280 Brochures are available at the Friends of the Library counter in the Main Branch s Astor Hall on the first floor 281 282 Granite plaques of similar style can also be seen on the sidewalks of Broadway in Manhattan s Financial District placed in honor of ticker tape parades held there in the past as well as on Broadway in the Garment District where plaques commemorate fashion designers 283 Landmark designations EditThe Main Branch was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1965 1 98 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1966 2 The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the exterior as a landmark in 1967 284 The Landmarks Preservation Commission subsequently designated Astor Hall the first to third floor stairs and McGraw Rotunda as landmarks in 1974 285 286 The Rose Main Reading Room and Public Catalog Room were separately made New York City designated landmarks in 2017 287 251 after a four year effort 288 In popular culture EditMain article New York Public Library in popular culture Film Edit The Main Branch appears or is depicted in multiple films including 42nd Street 1933 156 The Clock 1945 289 On the Town 1949 289 Pickup on South Street 1953 290 Breakfast at Tiffany s 1961 290 156 291 Two for the Seesaw 1962 290 You re a Big Boy Now 1966 291 The Possession of Joel Delaney 1972 290 Network 1976 290 The Wiz 1978 292 156 Ghostbusters 1984 293 290 291 Prizzi s Honor 1984 291 Regarding Henry 1991 290 291 Quiz Show 1994 291 Picture Perfect 1997 290 The Thomas Crown Affair 1999 289 290 291 Finding Forrester 2002 291 Head over Heels 2001 290 Maid in Manhattan 2002 291 Spider Man 2002 292 290 The Time Machine 2002 289 291 13 Going on 30 2004 290 291 The Day After Tomorrow 2004 290 291 292 Shortcut to Happiness 2004 290 Spider Man 3 2007 291 Sex and the City 2008 290 291 Uncertainty 2008 290 Arthur 2011 290 The Adjustment Bureau 2011 290 We ll Take Manhattan 2012 290 Winter s Tale 2014 290 Ex Libris The New York Public Library 2017 272 Television Edit Episodes of TV series that depicted the Main Branch included The Library an episode of Seinfeld 294 as well as The Persistence of Memory the eleventh part of Carl Sagan s TV series Cosmos 295 Literature Edit The Main Branch also appears in literature including Lawrence Blochman s Death Walks in Marble Halls 1942 296 Jane Smiley s Duplicate Keys 1984 297 298 Akimi Yoshida s Banana Fish 1985 299 Allen Kurzweil s The Grand Complication 2001 300 301 Cynthia Ozick s Heir to the Glimmering World 2004 302 Lynne Sharon Schwartz s Writing on the Wall 2005 303 304 Peng Shepherd s The Cartographers 2022 305 Poems include E B White s A Library Lion Speaks 306 and Reading Room in Poems and Sketches of E B White 1981 156 Richard Eberhart s Reading Room The New York Public Library in Collected Poems 1930 1986 1988 Lawrence Ferlinghetti s Library Scene Manhattan 307 in How to Paint Sunlight 2001 156 Excerpts from several of the many memoirs and essays mentioning the Main Branch are included in the anthology Reading Rooms 1991 including reminiscences by Alfred Kazin Henry Miller and Kate Simon 308 See also Edit Architecture portal New York City portal National Register of Historic Places portalList of National Historic Landmarks in New York City List of New York City Designated Landmarks in Manhattan from 14th to 59th Streets List of New York Public Library Branches National Register of Historic Places listings in Manhattan from 14th to 59th Streets New York Public Library in popular cultureReferences EditNotes Edit a b c The number of items varies widely between 1 8 and 4 million and a figure of 3 5 million is often cited However in 2015 the New York Public Library said that the Main Branch s collection numbered 2 5 million 8 As the flagship building of the New York Public Library system the Main Branch is often referred to as just the New York Public Library Furthermore the branch itself was originally called the Central Building 6 and was later known as the Humanities and Social Science Center 7 Other libraries including the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris and the Library of Congress renovated similar stacks so as to continue their original uses Citations Edit a b New York Public Library National Historic Landmark summary listing National Park Service September 16 2007 Archived from the original on December 5 2007 a b National Register Information System National Register of Historic Places National Park Service January 23 2007 Landmarks Preservation Commission 1967 Landmarks Preservation Commission 1974 Postal 2017 Handbook of the New York Public Library New York public library 1921 p 7 Retrieved January 10 2016 The Central Building of The New York Public Library Cummings Judith December 15 1976 Library Will Get 3 Million Grant From U S Fund The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 a b c d e A Slippery Number How Many Books Can Fit in the New York Public Library The New York Times November 28 2015 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 a b Landmarks Preservation Commission 1967 p 2 Hewitt et al 2006 p 288 City Will Accept Mr Carnegie s Libraries Formal Action by the Board of Estimate to Be Taken Tomorrow The New York Times March 17 1901 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 25 2017 a b c New Library Ready Early Next Year That Is the Great Marble Structure Will Open if There Are No More Delays The New York Times May 2 1910 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 16 2018 a b c d e f g h Postal 2017 p 2 Hewitt et al 2006 p 415 Reed 2011 pp 1 10 Hewitt et al 2006 p 287 a b Postal 2017 p 1 Public Library s Home A Strong Feeling in Favor of the Fifth Avenue Reservoir Site The New York Times March 26 1895 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 17 2018 a b Hewitt et al 2006 p 286 a b Carlson Jen January 16 2015 This Massive Reservoir Used To Be In Midtown Gothamist Retrieved July 18 2022 Hewitt et al 2006 pp 288 289 a b c d Postal 2017 p 3 a b Hewitt et al 2006 p 289 Hewitt et al 2006 pp 289 290 a b Public Library Blocked Mayor Van Wyck Opposes an Issue of 150 000 in Bonds to Prepare the Site The New York Times March 24 1898 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 17 2018 Hewitt et al 2006 pp 290 291 New York Public Library Eighty Eight Designs Submitted for the Building Twelve Will Be Selected The New York Times July 17 1897 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 17 2018 a b c d Hewitt et al 2006 p 291 Public Library Designs Competition Closed and the Jury Will Select Three Plans The New York Times November 2 1897 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 17 2018 Hewitt et al 2006 pp 291 292 The New Public Library Carrere amp Hastings s Design for a Great Building Adopted by the Trustees The New York Times November 12 1897 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved January 20 2023 a b Hewitt et al 2006 p 292 Model of the New Library Now on Exhibition in the Governor s Room at City Hall The New York Times December 30 1900 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 17 2018 a b c d e f Hewitt et al 2006 p 296 Where a Thousand May Read Architect Carrere Describes Future New York Public Library The New York Times February 14 1909 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 18 2018 a b c d Hewitt et al 2006 p 306 The New Public Library Board of Estimate and Apportionment Approves the Carrere amp Hastings Design The New York Times December 2 1897 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 17 2018 Hewitt et al 2006 p 294 a b c d e f Hewitt et al 2006 p 295 A Woman Sues John J O Brien Maude L Curran Seeks to Recover 1 608 75 from the ex Aiderman The New York Times June 8 1899 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved January 20 2023 a b c d e f g Postal 2017 p 4 Big Water Main Bursts The New York Times November 15 1900 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved August 13 2019 Trouble over the Library Contract The Lowest Bidder Asserts that He Was Unjustly Treated The New York Times June 26 1901 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 18 2018 a b c d e f g Gray David March 1911 A Temple of Modern Education New York s New Public Library Harper s Monthly Magazine Vol 122 no 730 pp 562 564 Retrieved December 20 2018 Senator Dubois Explains Idaho Republican Victory It Is Attributable to Passage of Irrigation Act by Last Congress He Says The New York Times November 11 1902 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 18 2018 a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Stephen A Schwarzman Building Facts The New York Public Library November 10 1902 Retrieved December 22 2018 Extension of Contract Not Asked New York Tribune August 25 1904 p 4 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Newspapers com Last Library Work New York Tribune January 28 1907 p 4 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Newspapers com More Library Delay New York Tribune December 16 1906 p 24 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Newspapers com a b c d e History of The New York Public Library The New York Public Library Retrieved December 17 2018 Moving a Million Books into the New Library Transfer of the Lenox and Astor Library Contents to the Beautiful New Building at Forty Second Street and Fifth Avenue a Big Undertaking The New York Times April 16 1911 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 16 2018 City Light Plant for Library Beaten Board of Estimate Votes It Down After Proof That it Would Save 27 000 Yearly The New York Times March 20 1909 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 18 2018 a b New York s Fine New Library Nearly Completed Will Be Ready Before the Contract Time and Needs Only the Interior Furnishings The New York Times December 11 1910 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 New Library Nearly Done Contractors Now Expect to Complete Their Work by May 1 The New York Times November 26 1910 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 18 2018 2 000 View Body of John M Carrere Prominent Men and Women in Throng That Passes Coffin in New Public Library Rotunda The New York Times March 4 1911 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 18 2018 a b City s 29 000 000 Library Is Opened Golden Key of the Marble Structure Delivered President Taft Making the Principal Address The New York Times May 24 1911 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 16 2018 a b c New York s Public Library Opened Buffalo Commercial May 23 1911 p 2 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Newspapers com Hewitt et al 2006 pp 296 297 a b Hewitt et al 2006 p 285 50 000 Visitors See New Public Library Attendants Busy Preventing Confusion as They Inspect the Great Building The New York Times May 25 1911 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved January 20 2023 Anderson David May 26 1961 Library Tricked on First Request Clerk Reveals Failure in 11 Was a Publicity Stunt The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 a b c d e f g h i j k l m Postal 2017 p 5 New Library Ready Early Next Year That Is the Great Marble Structure Will Open if There Are No More Delays The New York Times May 2 1910 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 18 2018 a b c d e f g h i Landmarks Preservation Commission 1967 p 1 Hewitt et al 2006 p 322 Great Crowds at Library Three Interesting Exhibitions Mark the Second Week in the New Building The New York Times June 1 1911 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 18 2018 Huxtable Ada Louise January 24 1971 Architecture The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 20 2018 a b c d e The Tuition Is Free at Every Man s University Democrat and Chronicle Rochester NY August 14 1976 p 8 Retrieved December 22 2018 via Newspapers com a b c Central Building Guide 1912 pp 7 9 Gee Henrietta April 18 1926 Behind the Scenes at the Library Brooklyn Daily Eagle p 107 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Brooklyn Public Library Newspapers com a b Barnard Eunice Fuller September 16 1928 The Silent Adviser of All New York The Public Library Serving Every Tongue and Quest Will Expand Its Outgrown Fifth Avenue Building The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 3 000 000 Visited Library in Year 10 877 171 Books Issued for Home Use in the City Report Shows The New York Times June 13 1929 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 a b c Library to Build 5th Av Extensions Plans Two Wings and New Unit in Bryant Park Subject to City s Approval The New York Times August 24 1928 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Readers Utilizing Leisure Hours Increase Library Attendance 40 The Sun and the Erie County Independent Hamburg NY September 6 1934 p 8 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Newspapers com 2 000 000 Annex to Public Library in New Projects Brooklyn Daily Eagle September 30 1928 p 47 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Brooklyn Public Library Newspapers com Hastings Will Asks Change In Library Architect of Building on Fifth Avenue Wanted Its Facade Improved The New York Times November 7 1929 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Stage History Brooklyn Daily Eagle June 4 1933 p 22 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Brooklyn Public Library Newspapers com a b Collins Glenn May 27 2003 Leaves of Grass Anyone A Reading Room Returns to Bryant Park The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Library Acquires Lost City History It Is Contained in 40 Copies of The New York Gazette The New York Times June 8 1936 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 a b c d e About the Berg Collection The New York Public Library Retrieved December 22 2018 a b Berg Memorial Room Which Was Dedicated Yesterday The New York Times October 12 1940 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Library Branches Renovated by 1 300 On Rolls of WPA Brooklyn Daily Eagle September 5 1935 p 16 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Brooklyn Public Library Newspapers com a b Relief Workers Repair Libraries All City s Buildings Including That at 5th Av and 42d St Are Being Renovated The New York Times June 30 1935 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 2 500 000 WPA Fund for Public Library Grant to Be Used for Repairs and Improvements at Main Building and Branches The New York Times August 22 1935 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 WPA to Build New Roof For the Public Library The New York Times February 19 1936 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 a b c Carmody Deirdre December 25 1981 Main Library to Revive Unused Exhibition Area The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 a b c Reif Rita April 4 1999 Art Architecture Seeing a Familiar Haunt Again but in a New Light The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 20 2018 a b New York Public Library restored to grandeur Press and Sun Bulletin Binghamton NY Associated Press September 29 1998 p 10 Retrieved December 22 2018 via Newspapers com War Books Losing Favor At Library Demand for Such Works Far Less Than That Recorded in 1914 and 1915 The New York Times March 14 1940 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Service Folk Get Room in Library Special Retreat Is Set Aside Where Men and Women in Uniform May Read The New York Times February 11 1943 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Library Additions Planned for City Central Building to Be Greatly Expanded and New One Put Up in Fifty Third Street The New York Times June 30 1944 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 a b c Campbell Barbara October 21 1970 Dream of Library Realized The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Ask City to Take Over Public Library Branch New York Daily News May 6 1949 p 408 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Newspapers com In the Book Processing Center of the Public Library The New York Times November 1 1949 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Library Main Hall Soon to Be Altered The New York Times October 22 1950 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 Library Will Get Fire Sprinklers Board of Estimate Allocates Fund to Guard 4 Million Volumes at 42d St The New York Times August 26 1960 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Library Renovation Starting The New York Times July 20 1964 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 a b Five Sites Listed as Landmarks The Post Standard Syracuse NY Associated Press December 21 1965 p 17 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Newspapers com a b c d e f Anderson Susan Heller October 27 1987 Library Starts Road to 84 Mile Shelves Under Park The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 a b c d e f g Stern Fishman amp Tilove 2006 p 538 5th Ave Building Sold Library Buys Property at 40th St for Investment The New York Times October 20 1961 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Crisis on 42d Street The New York Times February 13 1970 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 42d St Library to Close On Sundays Holidays The New York Times December 4 1970 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 Library Division Reopens The New York Times January 18 1972 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 a b The Library Lions Get Mudpacks as Part of the Full Beauty Treatment The New York Times November 13 1975 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 a b Fraser C Gerald February 4 1979 The Library Starts Fund Drive With Ad Campaign on Buses The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 McFadden Robert D April 16 2021 Vartan Gregorian Savior of the New York Public Library Dies at 87 The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 a b c d Dixon amp Morton 1986 p 89 a b Goldberger Paul April 25 1982 Architecture View Restoring the Public Library to Its Original Splendor The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 Carmody Deirdre July 8 1982 Public Library Under Gregorian Celebrating a Good Year The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 Goldberger Paul May 25 1984 Inside and Out Library Recaptures Its Splendor The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 Freedman Samuel G August 21 1982 G M Stuns a Village by Layoffs PDF The New York Times p 26 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 a b Rosenblatt 1984 p 3 Carmody Deirdre December 1 1983 Vast Rebuilding of Bryant Park Planned The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 a b c Carmody Deirdre April 6 1983 Library Restores Periodical Room s Splendor The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 a b c d e f g Stern Fishman amp Tilove 2006 p 539 a b Carmody Deirdre May 25 1984 Exhibition Hall Opens With a Flourish The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 a b c d e f g Postal 2017 p 10 a b c Johnston Laurie Anderson Susan Heller June 1 1983 New York Day by Day The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Computer Age Invades Library The Post Star Glens Falls NY Associated Press August 14 1976 p 24 Retrieved December 22 2018 via Newspapers com a b c d Jones Alex S September 23 1987 42d Street Library Opens 400 Seat Bartos Educational Forum The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved July 12 2022 a b c Stern Fishman amp Tilove 2006 pp 539 540 a b About the Pforzheimer Collection New York Public Library Retrieved December 22 2018 a b About the Miriam and Ira D Wallach Division of Art Prints and Photographs New York Public Library Retrieved December 22 2018 a b White Joyce October 16 1987 Library Bryant Park branching out New York Daily News p 155 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Newspapers com Bryant Park Project Approved The New York Times January 13 1987 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 Bryant Park to bloom again New York Daily News December 28 1980 pp 645 647 via Newspapers com a b Weber Bruce April 22 1992 After Years Under Wraps A Midtown Park Is Back The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 a b c d e f g h i Below Bryant Park a Bunker and a Train Line Just for Books The New York Times November 21 2016 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 a b Grimes William January 13 1994 Bill Blass Gives 10 Million to Library The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 Weber Bruce July 4 1997 Library s Storied Sanctuary Will Be Shut For Next 2 Years For High Tech Renovations The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 a b c d e Adams 1999 p 128 a b c d e f Stern Fishman amp Tilove 2006 p 542 Iovine Julie V November 5 1998 Design Notebook Open for Travel In Realms Of Gold The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Postal 2017 p 11 a b c Adams 1999 p 130 a b Bruni Frank November 17 1998 Library s Reading Room Reopens in Blaze of Glory The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 17 2018 Foderaro Lisa W September 2 1998 Metro Business State Helping Library The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 17 2018 a b c d Stern Fishman amp Tilove 2006 p 540 a b c d Dunlap David W August 22 1998 Updating a Bookish Aristocrat City s Main Library Adapts Itself for a Computer Age The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 a b c McDowell Edwin September 17 2000 For Public Library New Building Within the Old One The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 a b c d e Pogrebin Robin December 20 2007 A Centennial Face Lift for a Beaux Arts Gem The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 17 2018 The New York Public Library Will Restore its Fifth Avenue Building s Historic Facade Press release New York Public Library 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from the original on July 18 2020 Retrieved July 18 2020 New York Public Library Unveils 317 Million Master Plan The New York Times November 15 2017 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 17 2018 Nonko Emily November 16 2017 New Plans Revealed for New York Public Library s 317M Renovation Curbed NY Retrieved December 17 2018 Brody Leslie November 15 2017 New York Public Library Approves Master Plan to Renovate Flagship Library The Wall Street Journal Retrieved December 17 2018 Warerkar Tanay June 21 2018 New York Public Library Will Begin Its Main Branch Revamp Next Month Curbed NY Retrieved December 22 2018 Renovations to NYPL s Flagship Mean More Public Space AM New York June 21 2018 Retrieved December 22 2018 a b Spivack Caroline August 12 2019 NYPL s beloved lions will roar to life with 250K restoration Curbed NY Retrieved August 12 2019 a b NYPL s looming lions to get long awaited restoration am New York August 12 2019 Retrieved August 12 2019 About Our Divisions New York Public Library Retrieved December 22 2018 About the General Research Division New York Public Library Retrieved December 22 2018 About the Milstein Division of U S Local History and Genealogy New York Public Library Retrieved December 22 2018 New York Genealogical and Biographical Society Contributes Its 75 000 Volume Collection to The New York Public Library Press release New York Public Library July 21 2008 Retrieved December 22 2018 Cohen Susan April 20 2015 New Yorker Spotlight Behind the Reference Desk at the New York Public Library with Philip Sutton 6sqft Retrieved August 30 2019 About the Map Division New York Public Library Retrieved December 22 2018 a b About the Manuscripts Division New York Public Library Retrieved December 22 2018 About the Dorot Jewish Division New York Public Library Retrieved December 22 2018 3 000 Rare Books a Gift to Library Collection Presented by Dr Albert A Berg in Memory of Dr Henry W Berg The New York Times February 5 1940 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved 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Bath Then a Treatment The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 23 2018 Reed 2011 p 27 a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Stephen A Schwarzman Building Floor Plan PDF New York Public Library Retrieved December 17 2018 a b Hewitt et al 2006 p 300 Life Revealed at Library Sculptor George Grey Barnard s Work on Facade Discovered The New York Times January 1 1914 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 18 2018 Public Library Statuary Ruined Says Its Sculptor PDF The Sun May 2 1915 p 15 Retrieved December 18 2018 via Fultonhistory com a b c Hewitt et al 2006 p 301 Reed 2011 p 41 a b Dunlap David W July 9 2015 Beauty and Truth Fountains at the New York Public Library Flow Again The New York Times ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 20 2018 Fountains Flowing Again at Library The New York Times July 16 1957 ISSN 0362 4331 Retrieved December 22 2018 Hewitt et al 2006 pp 301 302 a b Hewitt et al 2006 pp 303 304 a b c d Hewitt et al 2006 p 304 a b Reed Henry Hope 1971 The Golden City New 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