Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919) / Carnegie Library of Steubenville

Side A: Andrew Carnegie was born in Dunfermline, Scotland. He immigrated to Allegheny City Pennsylvania with his family when he was 13. While operating the telegraphs for the Pennsylvania Railroad, Carnegie perceived the great need for steel in the railroad industry. With this insight, he founded the Carnegie Steel Corporation which operated for 35 years before he sold it to J.P. Morgan in 1901. Andrew Carnegie wrote the article, “Wealth” in 1889 in which he said that a responsible person of wealth should help his fellow man. Carnegie’s philanthropy provided 2,509 libraries throughout the world. Carnegie was already familiar with the city when he wrote a letter to offer funds to build the Steubenville library on June 30, 1899.(Continued on other side) Side B: (Continued from other side) As a young man, Carnegie was sent to a Steubenville telegraph office when a flood destroyed the wires between Steubenville and Wheeling. As part of his offer to build the library, Carnegie stipulated that the city’s citizens would have to provide the site and money to maintain the library. The library was one of the first funded by Carnegie in Ohio and opened on March 12, 1902. Designed by the Pittsburgh architectural firm of Alden & Harlow, the Richardsonian Romanesque building shares its style with a smaller Oakmont Pennsylvania library. Both libraries were designed using features of the 1888 Cambridge Massachusetts city hall. The diagonal brick patterns on the ends of the structure are unique to this building. This library was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1992.