The Packard Library is a historic library building located at 301 4th St. in Marysville,

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

. The library operated until 1977, when it was replaced by the new Yuba County Library. The library was added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

on December 18, 1978.

Background

Founded in 1855 as the "Marysville Library". Marysville, recently found in 1851, was very much a frontier-town, and was called the "Gateway to the

Gold Fields Gold Fields Limited (formerly The Gold Fields of South Africa) is one of the world's largest gold mining firms. Headquartered in Johannesburg, South Africa, the company is listed on both the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) and the New York St ...

." In 1855, the Young Men's Literary and Scientific Association founded a library to gather reading materials and maintain them in a

reading room Reading room may refer to: * Reference library * British Museum Reading Room The British Museum Reading Room, situated in the centre of the Great Court of the British Museum, used to be the main reading room of the British Library. In 1997, ...

where members of the association could use them. Initially, the library's collection was stocked with donations from the private collections of the association members. The first purchases made were made in New York and transported by sea. In December 1858, the association donated its collection to the city of Marysville and a room in the city hall was converted into a library. Three years later, the collection moved to the newly built

Masonic Hall A Masonic Temple or Masonic Hall is, within Freemasonry, the room or edifice where a Masonic Lodge meets. Masonic Temple may also refer to an abstract spiritual goal and the conceptual ritualistic space of a meeting. Development and history I ...

, only to move back to the city hall tens years later. In 1900, in response to the need for a larger space, Maryville pioneer and mining magnate donated land at Fourth and C Streets and $70,000 to erect a new building. In the

1850s The 1850s (pronounced "eighteen-fifties") was a decade of the Gregorian calendar that began on January 1, 1850, and ended on December 31, 1859. It was a very turbulent decade, as wars such as the Crimean War, shifted and shook European politic ...

, Packard had been a charter member of the library. He hired

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

architect William Curlett as architect for what eventually became known as the

Italianate The Italianate style was a distinct 19th-century phase in the history of Classical architecture. Like Palladianism and Neoclassicism, the Italianate style combined its inspiration from the models and architectural vocabulary of 16th-century It ...

and Beaux-Arts style Packard Library. The building was completed in March 1906 and opened to the public in October of that same year. There was a smoking room on the ground floor; the main reading room with the library's collection, administrative and work areas, and a children's area were on the first floor. The third floor held an auditorium. Overlooking the first floor was a

mezzanine A mezzanine (; or in Italian, a ''mezzanino'') is an intermediate floor in a building which is partly open to the double-height ceilinged floor below, or which does not extend over the whole floorspace of the building, a loft with non-sloped ...

which was the location of the "Poppy Room". The three-story building features

verandah A veranda (also spelled verandah in Australian and New Zealand English) is a roofed, open-air hallway or porch, attached to the outside of a building. A veranda is often partly enclosed by a railing and frequently extends across the front an ...

s on the east and west sides. The verandahs are supported by rectangular columns, and their roof lines are decorated with

acanthus leaves The acanthus () is one of the most common plant forms to make foliage ornament and decoration in the architectural tradition emanating from Greece and Rome. Architecture In architecture, an ornament may be carved into stone or wood to resemble ...

. The "Poppy Room" was used to house historic items (i.e. pioneer relics, photographs, diaries and manuscripts) of value to Yuba County. These items were transferred to the new Mary Aaron Museum in 1955. In 1972, the Yuba County Board of Supervisors created a county-wide library service, the Yuba County Library Service. The library of the City of Marysville, held at the Packard Library became the county library. After some deliberation it was determined that the needs of the community, and for cost reasons, it would be better to build a new building. This new building would be located at Second and C Streets. It opened in 1977 and is currently the one branch of the county library service.

References

External links

* * * {{National Register of Historic Places Buildings and structures in Yuba County, California Marysville, California Education in Yuba County, California Library buildings completed in 1906 Libraries on the National Register of Historic Places in California Beaux-Arts architecture in California Italianate architecture in California National Register of Historic Places in Yuba County, California 1906 establishments in California