1901:

After letters and telegrams from city officials, former Steel Magnate and noted Philanthropist Andrew Carnegie pledges $50,000 to build a public library in Vancouver. Carnegie, who has pledged funds to libraries across Canada and the U.S, and whose annual income is estimated at $25 million (in 1901 dollars), agrees to send the money, if city officials donate the land, and spend $5000 on the building per year.

“”It is the best news we have had for many a day,” beams Mayor T.O. Townley, “and, while of course I do not pretend to speak for the council, I can see no other end than that of the immediate acceptance of Mr. Carnegie’s generous offer. The question of a site is, of course, an important one.”

After a furious referendum, the site of the new library will be fixed at Main and Hastings, where it stands today, as the Carnegie Community Centre.

By the time of his death, Carnegie, whose personal dictum was “To spend the first third of one’s life getting all the education one can, to spend the second third of one’s life making all the money one can,” and “to spend the final third of one’s life giving it all away for worthwhile causes,” will have donated the modern equivalent of $ 4.3 billion of his personal wealth, all of it to philanthropic projects.

Image: Carnegie Public Library, Main and Hastings, circa 1910. Image courtesy of the Vancouver Archives.

IMAGE BONUS: Masonic Ceremony, for the laying of the cornerstone of the Carnegie Library, March 29th, 1902.