Donated to the public by entrepreneur Andrew Carnegie, it was built from 1886 to 1890 on a design by John L. Smithmeyer and Paul J. Pelz.

The library and musical conservatory was built of red and grey granite from Maine.

[4] The contractor was Vinalhaven, Maine's Bodwell Granite Company, which had furnished granite for major public works including the State, War and Navy Department building in Washington, DC., now called the Eisenhower Executive Office Building.

The Music Hall at the Braddock Library would not open until an 1893 expansion of that structure.

[6] After a 2006 lightning strike, the library reopened in a new building a few blocks north on Federal Street in 2009.