Between 1892 and 1923, Andrew Carnegie gave away nearly $42 million dollars in grants to build 1,689 libraries, in towns across America, thereby establishing the first public library system in the United States. More than half the grants went to mid-western towns, and most went to rural communities with populations less than 7,500 people. Sterling was fortunate to be one such community.
Three local women’s groups were responsible for fulfilling the requirements of a Carnegie Foundation Library Grant – the Zeta Zeta Club, the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, and the Sterling Reviewers, which still exists today.

Requirements included: (1) demonstration of need, (2) provision of a building site, and (3) documentation of maintenance funds. In 1912, the women of Sterling began an all-out fundraising drive that continued for over five years, raising money for the library’s building site, furnishings, and books. The Sterling City Council voted to issue a tax levy for maintenance of the building.

In 1915, a site for the library was chosen, right here facing the Logan County Courthouse Square, and purchased for $4,000. That same year, the City of Sterling was awarded a $12,500 Carnegie Foundation Grant to build its first library. Construction of the Classic Revival Style building began in 1916 and the new library was formally opened, with great fanfare, on April 12th, 1918.

Sterling’s Carnegie Library served the greater Logan County community until 1976, when a new library opened on the City Square. In recent years, this much beloved historical building has been affectionately referred to as the “Old Library”. It was placed on the National Register of Historical Places in 2001, and is a part of the Downtown Sterling Historic District, established in 2013. After changing hands numerous times, the Old Library is currently owned privately. Imagine all the youth so positively impacted not just by this Carnegie library, but by all 1,689 of them across the US and abroad.