One of Chattanooga's most historic downtown buildings has been sold. Attorneys Phil and Jennifer Lawrence have sold the 1904 Carnegie Library building at Eighth Street and Georgia Avenue to Todd and Christy McClain, owners of Cumberland Guaranty and Trust.
Sale price was $3.1 million.
Attorney Phil Lawrence said it will be hard to leave the architectural masterpiece that he and his wife have occupied for 18 and one-half years.
But he said, "We are certain that the McClains will take care of it just as we did as well as make some needed improvements."
Their title business, which is now above the Southern Star restaurant on Broad Street, will move there.
Attorney Lawrence said, "It is grand space and a wonderful place to go to work every day.
It is a classic structure that is inspiring to be around. It is comfortable and homey in a way."
He added, "But it's a lot of space for four lawyers." It has about 13,000 square feet on its three floors (including basement). There is also a two-floor parking deck with 55 spaces.
The Lawrences plan to move by Nov. 1 to the Krystal Building.
John Shearer wrote this history of the Carnegie Library in 2002 just before the Lawrences acquired it:
A small-but-significant local landmark is the Carnegie Library building at East Eighth Street and Georgia Avenue, which will be auctioned off by owner North American Royalties in the near future as debt liquidation.
Countless Chattanoogans frequented the building from 1905-40, while it served as the public library. Many also did after it became offices for charitable organizations such as the Community Chest, forerunner of the United Way, and when it was called the George H. Patten Building and used as a YMCA youth center in the 1940s, ‘50s and ‘60s.
But a much smaller number of Chattanoogans have been in the building since it was converted to private offices for the parent company of troubled Wheland Foundry more than 30 years ago. However, the architectural detail and the aesthetic look on the outside of the building have been enough to let people judge this book by its cover and give it a good review architecturally.
“I think it is a hidden treasure that Chattanooga doesn’t realize it has,” said former UTC librarian Joe Jackson, who calls himself a fan of library buildings in general. “The architecture is so perfectly balanced.”
The building opened on July 17, 1905, and had been built with a $50,000 gift from Pittsburgh steel magnate Andrew Carnegie. A native of Scotland, who came to the United States as a young boy with limited means, Carnegie had been an avid reader of the Scottish poet Robert Burns and other writers. As a result, he wanted others to enjoy the pleasures of reading as well.
So he gave money to help build hundreds of libraries in the United States and elsewhere. The first one was opened in his native town in Scotland in 1881, while the first ones in the United States were built in the Pittsburgh area.
He generally gave $2 per resident for the structures. He did not stipulate that each library be named for him, but he did ask that local officials set aside enough money for regular upkeep.
Virtually all his buildings were eye pleasing and well built, so he created not only fans of reading, but also fans of historic architecture.
On the first day the Chattanooga library opened, librarian Miss Margaret Dunlap welcomed some 1,500 people during an open house. Not only were their eyes entertained looking at all the books in the new surroundings, but also were their ears while an orchestra serenaded them.
The article on the opening also said that the building would have a cabinet in which bound volumes of The Chattanooga Times were to be kept.
One aspect of the library that seems as much a mystery as one of its suspense books on its shelves is who the architect was. Many sources credit noted local architect R.H. Hunt. Robbie Jones, a Nashville architectural historian who has done research into the Carnegie Libraries in Tennessee, said that he believes an Atlanta firm was to be hired, but that Hunt ended up doing the work.
But a 1971 article in the popular magazine, Architectural Digest, states that the original architect was famed New York designer Stanford White. He had also designed First Presbyterian Church here, although the church actually used White’s plans for another church.
The article, which was written in connection with the restoration work by the late Wheland/NAR executive Gordon Street Sr., says that the building was one of the last buildings designed by White. He had been shot and killed in 1906 in New York by Harry Thaw after Thaw became jealous that Thaw’s wife, young chorus girl Evelyn Nesbit, had been White’s mistress.
The 1971 article said that Street had enjoyed going into the library in his younger years and thought it would make an ideal office after noticing the building for sale in the late 1960s. He had recalled the building’s grandeur, so he hired the Los Angeles design firm of Cannell & Chaffin to bring back the building’s former magnificence.
Another noted Chattanoogan who enjoyed visiting the building in his younger years was Ralph McGill. But he was inspired more by the building’s books than its looks.
A resident of Highland Park, Mr. McGill used to travel the several blocks to the library to check out a book nearly every day when he and the building were young. His voracious reading helped give him a more progressive view of the world, and he went on to become one of the South’s most vocal voices for civil rights in the middle part of the 20th century as the editor of the Atlanta Constitution.
The old building helped produce a Pulitzer Prize winner in McGill, and now many fans are anxiously awaiting the next chapter in its story.