Andrew Heiskell Braille and Talking Book Library

The current location in the Flatiron District opened in 1991,[1] and may be the first US library to have braille and other accessible materials available to the public.

[1][2] The branch's prior location, which opened in 1953, was in SoHo on Sixth Avenue near Spring Street, which had previously held NYPL maintenance operations.

[3] Upon opening on 20th Street, the library's collection of more than 515,000 volumes was primarily circulated via mail order due to the space limitations of the branch's prior location,[2][1] with more than two thousand moving per day.

[4] The library, which is named for former NYPL Chair Andrew Heiskell, occupies six floors of an early 20th century building.

[4] As of 2019, it held about 14,000 braille titles, believed to be among the largest such collection in the United States and its circulation was 500,000 volumes annually.