Auburn Public Library

Sal is a voice that rides along as you drive Washington's roads: the road ahead, the pass, the stories of the places you pass.

Women in Auburn did the pushing and the staffing for the town's early libraries [1]. The town was promised $9,000 by Andrew Carnegie in 1912, and the building opened in 1914 on land given by Mr. and Mrs. Arthur C. Ballard, the couple who had originally platted Auburn as the Town of Slaughter [1]. Their deed carried a condition: the ground would return to the original owners once it stopped serving as a library [1]. The library is a two-story brick rectangle, 35 by 50 feet, on a cast concrete foundation, with a hip roof that flares slightly at the projecting eaves [1]. An extension at the center of the west side holds the main entry, a twelve-foot cast stone arch with two panel doors [1]. Long casement windows face front, smaller ones on the sides and back, each topped by a fixed window split into eight triangular panes [1]. It served for years until the shelves could no longer hold the books and magazines [1]. Voters approved a $225,000 bond issue in 1962, a new library opened in 1964, and the old proviso surfaced; the land went back to the Ballard family [1].