History of the Paul Sawyier Public Library:
The Woman’s Club of Frankfort started a library in 1906. It was first located in the McClure Building and was open one day a week. Any citizen could use the library by paying a fee of one dollar a year. Through the years the library was housed not only in the McClure Building but also in the Old Capital, the Masonic Building and finally in the present Woman’s club building on Washington Street. In this latter location, beginning in 1913, the library was open daily and became a free public library.
In 1955 a county wide bookmobile service was started by the Franklin County Homemakers’ Clubs. Donations of books by individuals and books given by the State Library made up the collection and a bookmobile library was opened in one room on the second floor of the County Courthouse.
The Woman’s Club Library and the Franklin County Bookmobile Library were combined in 1965 and housed in one room of the old Post Office Building, which was leased from the General Services Administration. The first library Board of Trustees named the library after Paul Sawyier, a local artist.
In 1971 a library tax petition drive was successful and resulted in the establishment of a County Library District. Under Kentucky law, the District Board was able to collect property tax moneys in order to provide operating funds for the library. The former library board now became a five member District Board with the necessary powers to operate the library. In addition to this Voting Board an Advisory Board was created in order to give wider community representation in the affairs of the Library.
In March of 1974 the District Board received the deed to the Old Federal Building on the condition that the building be used as a public library. After a contract was let for renovation of the building, the Library was moved to Fountain Place in December, 1974 where it operated until August, 1976 when the newly renovated building was opened to the public.
To meet the demands of increased usage and to make necessary repairs to the historic building a second successful tax petition drive was completed in 1990 that increased the tax rate. As a result, the District Board was able to increase hours, services and staff.
Today the Paul Sawyier Public Library has a staff of 12 full time and 18 part time employees and 20 volunteers who donate over 2400 volunteer hours per year. The Library is open seven days a week and circulates over 360,000 items a year to over 24,000 registered borrowers. The collection of over 116,000 items includes books, magazines, newspapers, videos, books on tape, music CD’s, computer CD-ROM’s, equipment and art prints. In the last 12 years the annual circulation has increased 130%.
During the last fiscal year the Bookmobile and the Children’s Room staffs provided 403 programs to over 10,000 children age 12 months and older. Over 1900 children participate in our annual Summer Reading Program.
We have recently begun a new homebound delivery program called "Books to You". Our goal is to provide reading materials to those patrons living in the county who cannot get to the Library or Bookmobile. Staff also delivers collections of books to those Daycares in the county who do not have the means to transport children to the Library.
With a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Library Foundation, the Library has purchased 6 additional public access computers, bringing our total to 12. The Library continues to be the only agency in the county that offers free access to the internet to the general public. Last year there were over 18,000 internet searches by the public on the Library’s internet terminals.
