After a ribbon-cutting ceremony on June 22, 2001, our new joint-use library opened to the public on July 5, culminating in a $3.4 million venture that the San Diego Union Tribune described as “an effort of epic proportions and planning. . . Twenty-one years of planning, to be exact.”
The idea for a siting a County library branch on the campus of Earl Warren Junior High School germinated in 1979, when Bill Berrier, then Superintendent of the San Dieguito Union High School District (SDUSD), suggested it in a letter to his colleagues. At the time, the Solana Beach branch tended to be transitory, regularly outgrowing its leased spaces as the City’s population and its collection expanded. Friends of the Solana Beach Library formed in March 1983 and, by October, had moved the branch to a 3,800-square-foot home in the Lomas Santa Fe Shopping Center. Within about decade, the branch was again cramped for space.
In 1995, according to a history by advocate Richard A. Schwartzlose, the Solana Beach City Council appointed Joe Kellejian and Marion Dodson to a sub-committee to work toward a new home for the library. Schwartzlose, along with fellow Society historian Jim Nelson and many others took up the challenge of creating a permanent, joint-use facility — and wrangling all of the agreements required to fund it.
An “epic” undertaking, indeed. It required dogged determination by the Friends team, along with tireless negotiations with the City of Solana Beach, SDUSD, the County of San Diego, and even, eventually, the State of California. Finally, according to reporting at the time, the entities committed their investments:
- SDUSD: 1.3 acres of and land $540,000
- City: $820,000
- County: $100,000
- Statewide School Construction Bonds: $960,000
- Friends of the Solana Beach Library: $780,000 in private donations — including a very sizable anonymous gift — raised in only eight months.
It was a masterful assemblage of agreements, but still shy of the total needed to complete construction. The shortfall was exacerbated by delays when, according to the North County Times, workers hit an aquifer during grading.
Budgets were tweaked; landscape plans edited; contractors encouraged to redouble their efforts. Earl Warren students’ families and the City of Solana Beach pitched in to close the funding gap. Friends of the Library, alone, raised and additional $56,000 for furnishings. Remarkably, the library was dedicated almost a year-to-the-day after groundbreaking.
“It’s a case of the community really wanting the library,” commented Bob Gottfredson, then president of Friends of the Solana Beach Library.
The group commissioned local artist Christie Beniston to create 10 mosaic panels to decorate the exterior of the new Library. The artist entitled her series “Community Knowledge,” saying that the panels were inspired by a quotation taken from Albert Einstein that emphasizes the pleasure in work and the knowledge of the resulting value to the community. Each panel illustrates a category of information found in the Dewey Decimal System and incorporates details unique to Solana Beach. The framing around the panels was inspired by a quilt design, an idea prompted by quilting bees and their communal contribution to communities. The pattern also represents a city grid, with overlapping, shared pathways for citizens, as well as the interaction of information and ideas. The 10 panels were installed in 2010; their number also symbolizes the number of locations the library had in the City since first opening in 1925 and before finding its permanent home.
The mosaics were removed in 2014 while Earl Warren Middle School was being renovated. They were installed on a prominent exterior wall facing Stevens Avenue in 2018.
