Gulfport-Harrison County Library

Gulfport's public library began in the City Hall in 1912, and a $10,000 Carnegie grant paid for a separate building that opened on April 2, 1917, with Mrs. S. M. Williams as librarian and a monthly allowance of $35. In 1926 the Carnegie library added a county extension department, and from 1941 a county bookmobile carried books outside the city. A west branch opened in 1947 with help from the Lions Club. The modernist building at 20th Avenue followed in 1966, and both Camille and Katrina left it heavily damaged.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Biloxi Beach Wade-In Marker — 11 mi
  The beachfront parking lot beside the Biloxi Lighthouse where state markers recall the 1959 and 1960 wade-ins that opened Mississippi's public beaches to Black residents.
• Biloxi Lighthouse — 11 mi
  A cast-iron tower lit in 1848 on the Biloxi beachfront, kept by women for most of its first century and still in service after Camille and Katrina.
• Ship Island and Fort Massachusetts — 13 mi
  A barrier island twelve miles off the Mississippi coast with a brick fort burned half-built in 1861, a Union prison camp, and the garrison post of the 2nd Louisiana Native Guard.
• Ohr-O'Keefe Museum of Art — 13 mi
  Frank Gehry's pavilions on the Biloxi waterfront, built around the pottery of George Ohr, the self-styled Mad Potter, and the rebuilt Pleasant Reed House.

More markers nearby

• Old Gulfport High School — steps away
• 1863 East Pascagoula Raid — 0.3 mi
• Gulfport Civil Rights Wade-In — 0.4 mi
• Soria City — 0.7 mi