It is named for Julia Bedford Ideson, who served as the system's first head librarian for 40 years.

[1] The Spanish Renaissance-style building[2] is part of the Central Library, and houses its archives, manuscripts, and Texas and Local History departments.

Designed in a Spanish Revival style, it replaced the prior Carnegie building.

In 1976 the Jesse H. Jones Building (as it was named in 1989) opened, and the main portion of the Central Library moved to it.

[4] Lana Berkowitz of the Houston Chronicle described a local legend that the Ideson Building was haunted by the ghosts of library caretaker Jacob Frank Cramer and his dog Petey.