By Carissa Signore

The Carnegie Library was built in Akron on Market Street in 1904 after building started in 1901, due to a grant given to the city by steel tycoon Andrew Carnegie. The grant amount was for $82,000 and the city had an architectural design contest to choose a building that would be constructed using the grant money. The winner of the contest was Akron native architect Frank O. Weary, responsible for building many iconic Akron buildings such as the Glendale Cemetery Chapel. The library offered many amenities such as a catalog of 21,000 books, free access to the public, reading rooms, reference room, study room, lecture hall and a bicycle station located in the basement. Soon, the building became too small for the growing collections of the library and it was moved from the building in 1942 and remained vacant until the Akron Art Museum claimed it in 1947. The Akron Art Museum moved across the street to its current location in 1981. Currently, the building sits at 69 E. Market St., as the offices of Brennan, Manna & Diamond. The façade of the building remains intact and is representative of the Beaux Arts Classical style of architecture meant to resemble a French cathedral. The building is also registered historic building listed in the National Register on January 19, 1983.