After 3-Year Absence, Books Are Back for an Encore at Library

The Los Angeles Central Library is back.

Almost three years after an arson fire destroyed and damaged more than 1 million books, the largest public library in the Western United States opened for business Monday at a downtown office building that will be its home for the next four years.

700,000 Books Restored

For 300 librarians, it was the culmination of months of hard work restoring the 700,000 books damaged by two fires in April and September of 1986. Most of the water-soaked and soot-stained volumes were freeze-dried and stored in a refrigerated warehouse to prevent mold and mildew.

“Everybody’s very excited,” Central Library Director Betty Gay said. “It’s like show time, the first day.”

Eight floors of the Title Insurance Building at 433 S. Spring St. will be home to the 1.8 million volumes of the library’s restored collection until renovation of the library’s landmark building on Flower Street is completed, probably in 1992.

Only a few patrons drifted into the spacious facility on Monday morning. But those who did discovered a modern, high-tech library where musty old card catalogues have been replaced by sleek new computer terminals.

“They took so long to open--three years,” said Roger Fuentes, a 55-year-old retiree as he tried to find a book by Gore Vidal on the computerized card catalogue. “I live nearby, and I spend my days in the library. It fills up my time and, at the same time, I always learn something new.”

Behind the scenes, librarians were still working hard to shelve the hundreds of thousands of books that until recently were stored among frozen rock lobster tails, egg rolls and school lunches in a Pasadena warehouse.

“It’s an awful mess,” librarian Romaine Ahlstrom said as she waded through a sea of boxes in a second-floor vault that houses the library’s collection of rare books. “But we only got the rest of our shelves on Friday.”

Most of the collection--which includes books by Mexican monks dating to the 16th Century--remains undamaged and intact, Ahlstrom said.

New Additions

New additions to the library include a learning center on the sixth floor where patrons can use audiotapes to study Italian, Spanish, Swedish and about 30 other languages. The center is adjacent to the library’s extensive--and only slightly damaged--collection of books in foreign languages.

Other sections of the library did not fare as well in the fire. Especially hard hit was the collection of books in sciences such as astronomy, oceanography and natural history. The library has been forced to replace these books with extensive purchases, Gay said.

“We’ve been inventorying books, cleaning books and buying books . . . so there won’t be gaps in the collection,” she said.

The reopening will also increase the books available at the city’s 63 branch libraries, which borrow from Central.

“The entire city has missed this library because it affects the services you can get in the branches,” said library public relations director Bob Reagan. “Today is a joyous day not only for the general public but also for the library system itself.”

Most of the 300 librarians at the new facility Monday seemed relieved to be away from the warehouses, where they had worked for months in freezers with the damaged books, and back to serving the reading public.

“This is a nice change from cleaning books,” said Sherie Sanford, who was working at the information and checkout counter in the building’s front lobby. “Three years of cleaning, stacking, and inventory,” she said, shaking her head.

Sanford checked out five adventure and mystery novels to Joe Hilden, an off-duty police officer. Hilden said he came to the library after hearing about the opening on a radio news report.

“I’ve been a loyal patron for 22 years,” he said. “I miss the old building.”

The handful of readers drifting through the stacks on the upper floors included former City Councilwoman Pat Russell.

“I just came to browse,” she said. “My husband and I spent our early years together in the L.A. Public Library. In the old days, we used to go the library and go dancing at the Biltmore.”

A ceremony and open house celebrating the opening of the library will be held at 10 a.m. Saturday.

No one has ever been charged in the 1986 arson fire, but the investigation is continuing, said Fire Department Investigator Jim Thorton.