History
Los Gatos Library
The Los Gatos Library was founded in 1898 by the Los Gatos Floral Society which donated more than 800 books for a reading room in the back of an East Main Street store that was built on stilts over the Los Gatos Creek. Later that year, the Women’s Christian Temperance Union gave 350 more books to the Town, which authorized $16 to fix up the reading room plus $8 per month for rent.
Several years later, the Board of Town Trustees began discussing sites for a permanent library. In 1901, Eugene Ford, station agent for the Southern Pacific Railroad in Los Gatos, wrote to industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie requesting funds to build a new library, and the Town received a $10,000 grant The Carnegie Public Library in Los Gatos opened in 1903 on University Avenue on a site that is now the parking lot of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. The one-story brick building housed one big reading room and about 1,300 books. In 1906, the library became the first in California to offer a children’s corner.
In 1954, the library moved to the former American Legion War Memorial building on East Main Street.
As the population of Los Gatos grew, a larger library was needed. In June 1966, the town dedicated a new Civic Center which included a library. Incorporated into the Civic Center’s award-winning design was the original cornerstone of the old Carnegie Library. The new stacks held more than 50,000 volumes and a record collection. The bigger building provided room for a collection of historic photographs, some dating to the 1870s, which are still on the walls today.
Many different times over the years, there have been proposals to build a new library, and various ways of funding it were explored. In the’90s, the Town applied for—but didn’t receive—a state grant that would have provided two-thirds of the cost of a new building. By 1994 the town had purchased property to the rear of the Civic Center, planning to use that land for a new library. Around this time there was discussion of a library bond issue. In 1998, Friends of the Library and the Library Board funded a needs assessment for a new library.
By the turn of the most recent century, it was clear that the town had definitely outgrown its library. Built when the population was less than one-third of what it is now, the building was inadequate to meet the high levels of usage and requirements of new technologies. So in October 2007, the Los Gatos Town Council began specific plans for a new library to be funded through redevelopment funds and existing Town reserves. In April 2008, the firm Noll & Tam Architects was hired to design the 30,000-square-foot building, and the official groundbreaking took place on June 21, 2010.
Friends of the Library
There have been two Friends of the Library organizations in Los Gatos. The first was founded in March 1980 with 31 charter members. Fundraising efforts included book sales held outdoors around the fountain on the Civic Center patio. The group’s purchases for the library included Sanborn maps of the Town from 1884-1949 and a microfiche reader for college catalogs. The Friends also undertook sponsorship of special children’s programs, free evening lectures for the community and an oral history project, among other endeavors. They also helped with special projects in the library, such as a library-inventory project.
One ongoing concern of the Friends was the need for a new library, as shown in this excerpt from the minutes of the Feb. 21, 1989, board meeting: “Members of the Friends were again urged to write to City Council Members (sic) stressing the cramped physical condition of the Library.” In June 1989, the Friends held a goal-setting meeting, and raising $1 million toward a new library was among the goals.
However, by February 1991, the Friends of the Library was in need of revitalization, according to minutes of the Library Board.
The next Friends incarnation filed non-profit incorporation papers and held its initial board meeting in September 1993, and by the time of the second board meeting there were already 164 dues-paying members. (Currently there are around 900 members.) The Friends opened its own bank account and the previous group’s funds, which had been held in the Library Trust Fund, were added to the account.
Activities of the Friends have been driven by its mission to focus attention on library service, facilities and needs. These activities are funded through used-book sales and grants, and they include sponsoring the popular Friday Forum speaker series, purchasing equipment needed by the library, and funding children’s programs.
In anticipation of a new library, in 2007 the Friends transferred money into a new bank account named “Fund for the Future.” The purpose of this account is to cover expenses involved in fundraising for the furnishings, fixtures and equipment in the new library. In June 2008 the Friends hired Netzel-Grigsby Associates, Inc. to conduct a campaign readiness assessment and help manage a capital campaign.
A goal of $2.1 million for furnishings, fixtures and equipment for the new library was set for the capital campaign titled “Once in a Generation,” and various Friends committees have been working on it since 2008. But even as the Friends raises awareness and funds for the new library it has worked so hard to see built, it continues to fund and support ongoing library programs and needs.
