On Lafayette Square in Buffalo, New York, you face the Buffalo & Erie County Public Library, built in 1964. The building before you is the current facility designed by James William Kideney & Associates and built in 1964, which replaced the original Cyrus Eidlitz Buffalo Public Library Building dedicated in February 1887. Before that, this parcel held the Erie County courthouse from 1816 to 1876.
The institution here began around 1835 as the Young Men's Association (not to be confused with the YMCA), a private subscription library where paid membership was required to borrow books. Prominent among its members was Mark Twain, who served as editor of the Buffalo Express from 1869 to 1871. In 1883 the Association launched a fund-raising campaign and an architectural competition that culminated in Eidlitz's 1887 design.
When that building was completed the Association turned over its collections to the citizens of Buffalo and the Buffalo Public Library was born, with no requirement for dues or membership. From 1897 to 1906 the library's director was Henry Livingston Elmendorf, formerly secretary of the American Library Association. Picture Mark Twain, once a member here, serving as editor of the Buffalo Express.