SF Public Library history

Despite pushes to consolidate the city’s existing libraries into a giant public library (Chronicle, Jan 10 1886), the Trustees thought it would be better to find a location that was separate and distinct for the city’s first free public library.

In 1888 the Library moved to the Larkin Street wing of City Hall at Civic Center.

Chiefly minutes, membership and financial records, and a scrapbook; together with a small amount of ephemera, bulletins, and clippings documenting the Sequoia Club's activities from its founding in 1892.

The buckskin bound photograph album contains 27 photographic prints documenting the California Midwinter International Exposition of 1894 in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, California as well as other significant locations in California.

The leather-bound volume contains 28 silver gelatin prints documenting the Miner family's home life in San Francisco from January to March 1904.

Includes correspondence and project and subject files documenting public infrastructure construction in San Francisco, following the 1906 earthquake and fire.

The bound volume contains 16 silver gelatin prints documenting James Rolph Jr.'s San Francisco mayoral campaign, which began on August 15, 1911.

The hand-bound album with the inscription “William H. Wilke” consists of 57 various sized photographic prints of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco, California, 1915.

In 1917, the new main library building, designed by George W. Kelham, opened in the Civic Center.

He rose through their ranks until he retired in 1929 as General Manager of North American operations.

The collection contains material on the activities of the Regional Service Committee of San Francisco, which was established in 1939 in response to the anti-San Francisco attitude of many California and Oregon counties.

The San Francisco Horsemen's Association (SFHA) was formed in 1940 as a nonprofit organization to foster an interest in horses and horsemanship and to share its member's passion for horses and trails with the Bay Area community.

The Carnaval Committee first met in March 1979.

Another partnership involved digitizing the performance work of Kularts, a local organization that has produced contemporary and tribal Pilipino arts in the United States since 1985.

In November 1986, California voters revised Proposition 13 to allow local governments to issue general obligation bonds if supported by a two-thirds vote.

In late 1987, Friends spawned a second entity, the San Francisco Library Foundation.

In April 1988, the California Senate placed a small bond on the ballot motivating Friends to ask the Board of Supervisors to approve a $120 million local bond for the voters.

The old main library, which was damaged in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, was rebuilt as the new Asian Art Museum.

The Commission on the Environment was created by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1993.

Since 2017, 35 archival collections have been combined — and digitized — in a special project of the San Francisco Public Library, UCSF Library and the GLBT History Society.