Santa Cruz/Garfield Park, Santa Cruz County

Monterey to San Francisco area, San Francisco Bay Area region

Garfield Park Branch Library
705 Woodrow Avenue
Santa Cruz, CA 95060

opened 1915
Public Library 1915-present
currently a public library

grant amount: $3,000
architectural style: Classical Revival (Type C)
architect: W. H. Weeks

The city of Santa Cruz received a total of $29,000 in Carnegie funds, $20,000 for the main library in 1902 and $3000 for each of three branches in 1913. All were designed by W.H. Weeks. The 1904 Romanesque Santa Cruz Main, his first design, was the scene of a 1910 visit by Andrew Carnegie, a festive civic event. It was demolished in 1966.

The Garfield Park neighborhood of Santa Cruz features a pattern of streets in concentric circles. Woodrow Avenue runs from the center out to West Cliff Drive just north of Point Santa Cruz and Seal Rock; the Garfield Park branch is at the corner of Woodrow Avenue and Naglee Avenue. It succeeded a library started by the city in 1908 in a room added to the firehouse. In size and style the small stucco gable roofed library is compatible with the surrounding homes, but the Classic elements of the entrance, the window treatment, and the parklike grounds, convey its public purpose. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1992.