Richmond Public Library (United States)

The city council had to furnish a site for the building and guarantee that $10,000 in municipal funds would be budgeted for the library each year.

Despite the support from the majority of Richmond's civic leaders, the city council rejected Carnegie's offer.

A combination of aversion to new taxes, fear of modernization, and fear that Carnegie might require the city to admit black patrons to his library account for the local government's refusal.

[citation needed] A Richmond Public Library did open in 1924 with alternative sources of funding.

In 1947, RPL Board opened all branches of the library system to black people.