Laying of the new Pekin library and Dirksen Center cornerstone

By Jared Olar

Library Assistant

Last week we recalled the visit of U.S. President Gerald R. Ford to Pekin on Aug. 19, 1975, for ceremonies dedicating the new Everett McKinley Dirksen Congressional Research Center and Pekin Public Library.

The date of President Ford’s visit was chosen because it was the 73rd anniversary of the laying of the cornerstone of Pekin’s Carnegie library. The cornerstone of the new library and Dirksen Center had been dedicated by President Richard Nixon during his visit to Pekin on June 15, 1973, but even after the visits of two U.S. presidents in two years, the cornerstone of the new library and Dirksen Center facility still awaited its formal laying ceremony.

Before that day came, the library would get a new director, Dr. William C. McCully Jr. of Champaign and Downers Grove, hired by the library’s Board of Trustees in Sept. 1975.

The honor of laying the new library’s cornerstone went to Pekin Mayor William Waldmeier, who wielded a trowel to apply mortar around the cornerstone on the east side of the library building during ceremonies at a Library Open House on Sunday afternoon, Oct. 26, 1975.

Pekin Mayor William Waldmeier uses a trowel to mortar the cornerstone of the new Pekin Public Library and Dirksen Center during a ceremony on Sunday, Oct. 26, 1975.

More than 200 people attended the event. The cornerstone laying ceremony and the open house were conducted by the library board and emceed by Mr. Merle Glick, who announced to the attendees that the new library facility was completely paid for and was debt-free.

The event included tours of the library and Dirksen Center, and a special reception sponsored by the Friends of the Library in honor of Miss Josephine Goldsmith, who had recently retired after having served 44 consecutive years as a library board member. As we recalled in a previous Local History Room column, Miss Goldsmith had been instrumental in the organizing of the first Children’s Story Hours at the Pekin Carnegie library in the 1920s and 1930s.

Miss Josephine Goldsmith, far right, displays a special framed copy of a photograph of the very first Pekin Public Library Children’s Story Hour taken in the early 1920s. Children’s Story Hour was launched by Miss Goldsmith when she was a library staff member. She became a library board member in 1930 and served on the board for 44 years, retiring in 1975. The framed story hour photo, with a small plague added beneath it, was presented to Miss Goldsmith at a reception in her honor that followed the laying of the library cornerstone on Sunday, Oct. 26, 1975. Shown in this photo with Miss Goldsmith are (from left to right) Mrs. Grace Witt, vice president of the Friends of the Library, along with the Friends’ reception committee members Mrs. Estella Groen, Mrs. Fran Zobel, Mrs. Helen Krpan, and Miss Helen Wainman.

During the reception, Miss Goldsmith was presented with a framed photograph of the very first Children’s Story Hour. The photo, which bears a plaque commemorating Miss Goldsmith’s service, was displayed in the children’s department for many years, but now is preserved in the library’s archives.

A news report in the Oct. 27, 1975 edition of the Pekin Daily Times said, “Tours of the complex were conducted by Mrs. Paula Weiss, children’s librarian, Mrs. Dorothy Heisel, adult department and research librarian, and John Gay, executive director of the Dirksen Endowment Fund.”

Continuing, the article said that Glick —

“introduced members of the board, Miss Vera Dille and Nelson Eddings, both of whom served on the cornerstone committee; Miss Josephine Jubain, board president; and Mrs. Elizabeth Schramm, Melvin Burling, and Richard Lashbrook. Rev. Roy Davis, a member of the board, was unable to attend.

“Glick told the audience that the day was a very special one for Miss Goldsmith. As a child in 1902, she attended the cornerstone-laying ceremony of the old Carnegie Library which was demolished to make room for the new complex. ‘She stood at the corner of Broadway and Fourth streets to witness the event, but found it boring and went home before it was over,’ he said.

“He also introduced Mrs. Louella Dirksen who briefly addressed the audience telling of her association with Miss Goldsmith; and the new library director, Dr. William McCully, Jr. who said that Pekin is at least two years ahead of other libraries. . . . Also attending the event were Dr. Robert Jones, librarian of Bradley University Library; and Mrs. Arthur Ehrlicher, of Ann Arbor, Mich., a former Pekin library director.”

Next week we will review the early years of the new Pekin Public Library during the 1970s and early 1980s and will recall some significant changes in the library’s operations in those days.

Mr. Merle Glick discharges his duties as master of ceremonies at the Pekin Public Library’s cornerstone laying celebration on Sunday, Oct. 26, 1975. During the event, the library also honored retiring board member Miss Josephine Goldsmith (shown at far left). Also shown are (front row, from left) Mrs. Louella Dirksen and Pekin Mayor William Waldmeier, and (back row, from left) Miss Josephine Jubain, library board member, Dr. William McCully Jr., library director, and John Hackler, architect of the new library building and Dirksen Center.

Dr. William McCully Jr., library director, shows library patrons the old Bavarian “Grandfather” clock during the reception following the laying of the cornerstone of the new Pekin Public Library and Dirksen Center facility on Sunday, Oct. 26, 1975. The clock was donated to the library circa 1938 by the family of Pekin Mayor Everett Wilson, and was purchased by the Friends of the Library’s “Save the Clocks” committee during the 1974 auction of the Carnegie library’s contents and then donated back to the library.

#childrens-story-hour, #dorothy-heisel, #dr-robert-jones, #dr-william-mccully-jr, #elizabeth-schramm, #john-b-hackler-and-co, #john-hackler, #library-cornerstone, #louella-dirksen, #melvin-burling, #merle-glick, #miss-helen-wainman, #miss-josephine-goldsmith, #miss-josephine-jubain, #mrs-arthur-ehrlicher, #mrs-estella-groen, #mrs-fran-zobel, #mrs-grace-witt, #mrs-helen-krpan, #nelson-eddings, #paula-weiss, #pekin-public-library, #pekin-public-library-history, #rev-roy-davis, #richard-lashbrook, #vera-dille, #william-waldmeier

President Nixon dedicates cornerstone of new Pekin library and Dirksen Center

By Jared Olar

Library Assistant

As construction proceeded in 1973 on the new Pekin Public Library and Dirksen Congressional Leadership Research Center, library and city officials paused for a moment on May 31 of that year to look back at the library’s and city’s past by opening the Pekin Carnegie library’s 1902 time capsule, which had been secured in a hollowed-out niche in the library’s cornerstone.

The next step, naturally, was to have a formal ceremony dedicating the new facility’s cornerstone. Because the facility was to house a research center dedicated to the late Sen. Everett M. Dirksen of Pekin, who was the leader of the U.S. Senate’s Republicans as Senate Minority Leader, Dirksen’s widow Louella extended an invitation to the Republican U.S. President Richard Nixon and First Lady Pat Nixon to come to Pekin and conduct the cornerstone unveiling and dedication that summer.

The president and first lady graciously accepted the invitation. Given their personal and political ties to the late Sen. Dirksen and his family – which included the Dirksens’ son-in-law, Republican Sen. Howard Baker of Tennessee – the Nixons were pleased to honor the memory of their friend and ally in his hometown.

But this was also the time when the Watergate scandal had begun to heat up, with the hearings of the U.S. Senate’s Watergate investigation committee being televised from May 17 to Aug. 7. The Nixons must have welcomed the opportunity to leave Washington, D.C., for a few days during those months.

The community of Pekin, for its part, was generally very happy to welcome the president for the dedication ceremony, for it is not every day that a sitting U.S. president comes to visit a small city like Pekin. A very great deal of work had to be done in a relatively short period of time to prepare for the visit, including the construction of bleachers and a speaker’s platform along Broadway adjacent to the library, the placement of heavy metal barrels for security along the route that the president’s motorcade would travel, the coordination of security details and local law enforcement (which included the placing of armed guards atop nearby buildings, including the Carnegie library itself), and the printing and distribution of invitations and tickets to the event.

This Pekin Daily Times print from the Pekin Public Library’s Local History Room collection shows U.S. President Richard Nixon and Mrs. Louella Dirksen, widow of Sen. Everett M. Dirksen of Pekin, unveiling of the cornerstone of the new library and Dirksen Center facility on Friday, June 15, 1973.

The coming of Mr. and Mrs. Nixon to Pekin was not confirmed until June 11, 1973, as announced by a banner front page headline in the Pekin Daily Times that day – “It’s Official! Nixon Coming to Pekin!” Word had already begun to leak out of the possibility of the president’s visit in the week prior, when it was noticed that the Secret Service and White House officials were in town.

Just four days after the visit was confirmed, on Friday, June 15, 1973, the president and first lady flew into the Greater Peoria Airport near Bartonville, landing at about 11 a.m. and arriving in time for the ceremonies in Pekin at about 11:30. The event attracted a jubilant crowd of about 10,000 to the immediate area next to and near the library, while many other people lined streets and roads along the route of the presidential motorcade.

This Pekin Daily Times print from the Pekin Public Library’s Local History Room collection shows U.S. President Richard Nixon addressing a vast crowd in Pekin during ceremonies dedicating the cornerstone of the new Pekin library and Dirksen Center on Friday, June 15, 1973.

Numerous national, state, and local public officials attended the event, including Illinois Gov. Dan Walker, a Democrat. Both the Republic president and the Democrat governor were to see their careers brought down by scandal – and both would later experience somewhat of a rehabilitation of their reputations in certain circles.

The event culminated in a speech by the president and the unveiling and dedication of the cornerstone by President Nixon and Mrs. Louella Dirksen.

Afterwards, the cornerstone was set aside in a safe place so it could be brought out again for a cornerstone-laying ceremony when the library and Dirksen Center was complete. Meanwhile the president and first lady returned to face the political repercussions of the Watergate coverup that were looming ever larger day by day.

Next time we will tell of the founding of the Friends of the Pekin Public Library, and recall the 1974 auction of the furnishings of the Pekin Carnegie library.

U.S. Army Sgt. Stan Newell, a former Vietnam War POW, leads the assembled crowd in the Pledge of Allegiance during the visit of U.S. President Richard Nixon to Pekin on Friday, June 15, 1973. Nixon came to Pekin on the invitation of Mrs. Louella Dirksen, widow of U.S. Sen. Everett M. Dirksen of Pekin, so he could unveil and dedicate the cornerstone of the new Pekin library and Dirksen Congressional Research Center.

A platform and bleachers were erected in the area of Broadway and Sabella streets adjacent to the Pekin Public Library in the days prior to the visit of U.S. President Richard Nixon on Friday, June 15, 1973.

This Pekin Daily Times print from the Pekin Public Library’s Local History Room collection shows a guard atop the Pekin Carnegie library during the visit of U.S. President Richard Nixon to Pekin to dedicate the cornerstone of the new library and Dirksen Center on Friday, June 15, 1973.

It’s not every day that a sitting U.S. president visits Pekin, and when he does it is bound to be front page news. As it was an afternoon paper for most of its history, the Pekin Daily Times was able to get its story on Nixon’s visit into print the same day, before any other area newspaper.

#dirksen-congressional-research-center, #everett-mckinley-dirksen, #gov-dan-walker, #howard-baker, #library-cornerstone, #louella-dirksen, #pat-nixon, #pekin-carnegie-library, #presidents-in-pekin, #richard-nixon, #stan-newell

Looking back over 155 years of Pekin library history

By Jared Olar
Library Assistant

This month the Pekin Public Library marks an important anniversary in its history: it has been 125 years since the library became a branch of Pekin’s city government. It was in Feb. 1896 that the city of Pekin formally assumed the ownership and management of the old Pekin Library Association, a private corporation that was first organized in Nov. 1866.

So, while the library itself will turn 155 this November, the institution known as “Pekin Public Library” is now 125 years old. This anniversary provides a good occasion to take a look back over the library’s history. In today’s column, we’ll run through a general overview of the history of the library and the library building. In columns over the next few weeks and months, we’ll take close looks at specific aspects and episodes of the library’s history.

As both longtime residents of Pekin and attentive visitors to the library know, the current Pekin Public Library building is not the first one to be erected on its site. Prior to the construction of the current library in 1972, Pekin’s readers were served by a smaller structure that stood at the corner of Fourth Street and Broadway. When the old library was demolished, its former site became a sunken plaza, but since the 2015 remodel and expansion of the library, the old sunken plaza is no more, replaced by a quiet reading room and a grove of trees with water drainage.

That earlier library structure – one of the nation’s many Carnegie libraries, built in 1902 under the patronage of famous American industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie – was the first building constructed in Pekin to serve specifically as a public library. In 1900, Miss Mary Elizabeth Gaither (1852-1945) had written to both Carnegie and to Pekin banker George Herget, seeking their support for the construction of a library building. Carnegie agreed to provide funds, and Herget donated land to the city to provide a site for the new library, and Bloomington architect Paul O. Moratz was hired to design it.

Shown in this clipping from a 1901 edition of the Pekin Daily Times is Bloomington architect Paul O. Moratz’s sketch of his proposed design for the 1902 Pekin Carnegie Library. It has been 125 years since the city of Pekin assumed ownership of the Pekin Public Library.

To celebrate this milestone in Pekin’s history, a formal dedication ceremony took place on Tuesday, Aug. 19, 1902. On that occasion, the library’s cornerstone was laid – and within the cornerstone was placed a time capsule containing an assortment of documents and relics pertaining chiefly to the history of the plans and preparations leading up to the construction of Pekin’s Carnegie library.

The time capsule remained sealed for 70 years. When the old library was replaced with a new, expanded facility in 1972, the cornerstone was opened and the contents of the time capsule were found to be in a very good state of preservation. For many years after that, the cornerstone materials were stored at Herget Bank, later being transferred to the Pekin Public Library’s own historical archives, where they are stored and preserved today.

Among the items that had been placed in the 1902 time capsule were two local newspapers from February 1896 – a copy of the Pekin Daily Tribune and a copy of the Pekin Daily Evening Post, both of 13 Feb. 1896. They were selected for the time capsule because that date was close to the day that the library became a municipal body of Pekin’s city government.

Shown here is part of the front page of the Feb. 13, 1896, Pekin Daily Tribune, one of the newspapers that was preserved in the 1902 Pekin Public Library cornerstone time capsule.

Miss Gaither, whose actions and advocacy were responsible for the construction of our Carnegie library, prepared a historical report for the Library of Congress in 1903, in which she related the story of the library from 1866 to 1903. (Her historical account had previously been included in the 1902 time capsule.) Her “History of the Pekin Public Library” says:

“On November 24th, 1866, a large number of the ladies of Pekin met to organize what was for many years known as the ‘Ladies Library Association.’” Also included in the cornerstone time capsule was one of the handwritten invitations to that meeting.

On March 5, 1883, the Pekin Library Association formally incorporated under the laws of the State of Illinois – the original, sealed articles of incorporation from 1883 also were included in the cornerstone time capsule.

Ten years later, on Feb. 6, 1893, the Library Association petitioned the city to have the library and its collection handed over to the city’s ownership. The process of transferring the library from private to public control was completed three years later.

Pekin’s Carnegie Library served the community for seven decades, after which construction began on an entirely new library in 1972 – the one still in use today. The new facility was also the home of the Dirksen Congressional Center for 28 years, and in June 1973, President Richard Nixon came to Pekin to dedicate the Dirksen Center. Two years later, in August 1975, President Gerald Ford returned to dedicate the new library building.

Since then, the Pekin Public Library has benefited from advances in technology and some remodeling. The most significant changes came in 2014 and 2015 thanks to a $6 million remodel and expansion that included a new entrance, community and conference rooms, study rooms and a quiet reading room, and a fresher, brighter, and lighter look within and without.

#andrew-carnegie, #carnegie-library, #dirksen-center, #dirksen-congressional-research-center, #george-herget, #gerald-ford, #herget-bank, #ladies-library-association, #library-cornerstone, #mary-elizabeth-gaither, #mary-gaither, #miss-gaither, #paul-o-moratz, #pekin-daily-evening-post, #pekin-daily-tribune, #pekin-library-association, #pekin-library-cornerstone-time-capsule, #pekin-public-library, #pekin-public-library-history, #presidents-in-pekin, #richard-nixon

The Pekin Public Library’s early history: A glimpse inside a time capsule

This is a reprint of a “From the Local History Room” column that first appeared in March 2013 before the launch of this weblog.

A glimpse inside a time capsule

By Jared Olar
Library assistant

Each week this column delves into the Pekin Public Library’s Local History Room collection to see what we can learn about various aspects, anecdotes and artifacts of Pekin and Tazewell County history. This week we’ll turn our attention toward the history the Pekin Public Library itself, by taking look at a few of the contents of the library’s Cornerstone Time Capsule collection.

As both longtime residents of Pekin and attentive visitors to the library know, the current library building is not the first one to be erected on it site. Prior to the construction of the current library in 1972, Pekin’s readers were served by a smaller structure that stood at the corner of Fourth Street and Broadway, where the library’s sunken plaza is located today. [NB: Since the 2015 remodel and expansion of the library, the old sunken plaza is no more, replaced by a quiet reading room and a grove of trees with water drainage.]

That earlier structure – one of the nation’s many Carnegie libraries, built in 1902 under the patronage of famous American industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie – was the first building constructed in Pekin to serve specifically as a public library. To celebrate that milestone in Pekin’s history, a formal dedication ceremony took place on Tuesday, Aug. 19, 1902.

On that occasion, the library’s cornerstone was laid – and within the cornerstone was placed a time capsule containing an assortment of documents and relics pertaining chiefly to the history of the plans and preparations leading up to the construction of Pekin’s Carnegie library.

The time capsule remained sealed for 70 years. When the old library was replaced with a new, expanded facility in 1972, the cornerstone was opened and the contents of the time capsule were found to be in a very good state of preservation. For many years after that, the cornerstone materials were stored at Herget Bank, later being transferred to the Pekin Public Library’s own historical archives.

Placed in the cornerstone time capsule were five local newspapers, three of them from August 1902 and two of them from February 1896. The reason for including three August 1902 newspapers is obvious – they are issues with dates that are close to the day of the cornerstone laying: the Pekin Daily Post-Tribune of Aug. 18, 1902, the Pekin Daily Times of Aug. 16, 1902, and the Pekin Freie Presse of Aug. 14, 1902. (Pekin formerly had a German language newspaper due to the heavy influx of German immigrants to Pekin in the mid- to late 1800s.)

The reason for including the two newspapers from February 1896 is probably not obvious to anyone not well versed in the library’s history, however. Those newspapers – the Pekin Daily Tribune and the Pekin Daily Evening Post, both of 13 Feb. 1896 – were chosen because that date was close to the day that the library became a municipal body of Pekin’s city government.

The library’s history did not begin in 1902, but in fact reaches back to 1866, as we read in one of the documents placed in the 1902 cornerstone: a “History of the Pekin Public Library” written by Miss Mary Gaither. “On November 24th, 1866, a large number of the ladies of Pekin met to organize what was for many years known as the ‘Ladies Library Association,’” Gaither wrote. Also included in the cornerstone was one of the handwritten invitations to that meeting.

On March 5, 1883, the Pekin Library Association formally incorporated under the laws of the State of Illinois – the original, sealed articles of incorporation from 1883 also were included in the cornerstone time capsule.

Ten years later, on Feb. 6, 1893, the Library Association petitioned the city to have the library and its collection handed over to the city’s ownership. The process of transferring the library from private to public control was completed three years later, in 1896.

Shown here is part of the front page of the Feb. 13, 1896, Pekin Daily Tribune, one of the newspapers that was preserved in the 1902 Pekin Public Library cornerstone time capsule.

Shown here is the top front of the outer sleve of the Feb. 13, 1896, Pekin Daily Tribune, one of the newspapers that was preserved in the 1902 Pekin Public Library cornerstone time capsule.

#andrew-carnegie, #carnegie-library, #ladies-library-association, #library-cornerstone, #mary-gaither, #pekin-daily-evening-post, #pekin-daily-times, #pekin-daily-tribune, #pekin-freie-presse, #pekin-library-association, #pekin-library-cornerstone-time-capsule, #preblog-columns

Display of Pekin Library artifacts

Attention all local history or library history buffs:  Currently on display in the Pekin Public Library’s Local History Room is an assortment of artifacts and documents from the library’s past.  Several of them are items that were preserved in the cornerstone time capsule of Pekin’s old Carnegie Library which served the community from 1902 to 1972.  The artifacts will be on display in March and April. Courtesy of Pekin Public Library Public Information and Programming Manager Emily Lambe, a gallery of photographs of the display is presented below.

This photograph from the 1930s shows Pekin’s old Carnegie Library. One of the two cast-iron lamps at the entrance steps was saved when the library was demolished in the early 1970s. The lamp stood in the new library’s plaza until 2014, at which time it was restored and refurbished so it could be moved to the remodeled and expanded library’s new Local History Room.

#library-cornerstone, #pekin-public-library

A man, a bank and a library

Here’s a chance to read again one of our old Local History Room columns, first published in May 2013 before the launch of this blog . . .

A man, a bank and a library

By Jared Olar
Library assistant

The Herget name has been prominent in Pekin’s history since the 1850s and 1860s, when the Herget family left Hesse-Darmstadt in Germany and came to America. Of that family, the immigrant brothers John, George and Philip each played significant roles in the development of Pekin. Evidence of the continuing legacy of the Herget family is found today in the name of the Herget House (or Herget Mansion) at 420 Washington Street, and, of course, in Herget Bank.

Another of the indications of the prominence of the Hergets in Pekin’s history and community life may be found in the 1894 “Portrait and Biographical Record of Tazewell and Mason Counties, Illinois.” Included in that volume were the biographies of four members of the Herget family: the three immigrant brothers John, George and Philip, and John’s second son John H. Herget.

The lives of the three brothers were intertwined, as they often partnered in various business ventures. The eldest, John, also served as Mayor of Pekin in 1873 and 1874. Rather than presenting an account of all three brothers, however, this column will take a look at the life of George Herget, relying chiefly on the account of his life in “Portrait and Biographical Record,” page 384.

This photograph of George Herget was preserved in the 1902 Pekin Public Library cornerstone time capsule. Herget donated the land on which the library was built that year.

At the time that biography was published, George Herget was president of the Globe Distilling Co., president of the Pekin Electric Light Co., and president of the Pekin Steam Coopering Co. The biography said that he “ranks among the most prominent and successful business men of central Illinois, and has not only sustained the reputation of the family name, but by his honorable and worthy life has added to its lustre,” praising him for his “superior intelligence, sound principles and noble character,” and commenting that, “he is always an earnest advocate of the cause of justice and right, and has exerted a beneficial influence in the community with whose interests his own have long been identified.”

The biography continues, “Born May 9, 1833, the subject of this sketch is a native of Hergeshausen, Kreis Deiburg, Hesse-Darmstadt, Germany . . . . In his native land he spent the days of boyhood, and learned the trade of a wagon-maker. In 1852 he took passage at Havre, France, on a sailing-vessel bound for America, and after landing in New York, proceeded to Gettysburg, where he engaged in the trade of a carriage-maker until the fall of 1853.

“Coming west at that time via the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, Mr. Herget settled in Pekin, where he became a carriage-maker in the T. & H. Smith Carriage Works. In 1858 he embarked in the retail grocery business, and two years later he was joined by his brother John.” Together, John and George founded J. & G. Herget Inc. of Pekin, wholesale sellers of groceries and liquor.

The sketch continues, “In 1870 he built a block containing two stores, and there, since 1871, he has conducted an extensive business, being for some time in the wholesale grocery and liquor business, but now devoting his attention wholly to the latter line of work.

“In 1888 Mr. Herget assisted in the organization of the Pekin Steam Coopering Company, and has since been its President. In the fall of 1892 he built the Globe Distillery, which was completed and opened in April of the following year. This concern is situated on the Jacksonville South-eastern Railroad, and has a capacity of five thousand bushels per day, being the largest distillery in Pekin. In addition to these enterprises, Mr. Herget is interested in the Globe Cattle Company, which owns about thirty-eight hundred head of cattle. In the organization of the Electric Light Company he was a prominent factor, and has been its only President.”

It was George’s nephew Carl Herget, son of John, who built the Herget Mansion on Washington Street in 1912. One the most significant parts of the Herget family’s legacy, however, was the establishment of Herget Bank on April 17, 1905. George Herget and his sons Henry G. Herget and William P. Herget founded the bank as George Herget and Sons, and were among the bank’s original board of directors. The bank was chartered nationally in 1910, when it became Herget National Bank of Pekin, Ill.

Another lasting legacy of George Herget was the construction of the Pekin Carnegie Library in 1902. Herget played an important role in the events leading up to the library’s construction. When Mary Gaither had begun to drum up support for a Carnegie Library, Herget responded favorably, writing in a letter of Nov. 8, 1900, “I will be pleased to give to the City of Pekin a site for a Library building according to the terms of a certain letter to you from Mr. Andrew Carnegie, dated October 8th., 1900.”

Copies of that and other related letters were included in the library’s cornerstone time capsule in August 1902. Also included in the time capsule was the title deed conveying the land for the library from George and Caroline Herget to the city of Pekin, along with a photograph of George Herget.

#andrew-carnegie, #carl-herget-mansion, #george-herget, #herget-national-bank, #library-cornerstone, #mary-gaither, #pekin-history, #pekin-public-library