Huguenot Children’s Library Celebrating 25th Anniversary

The Huguenot Children’s Library turned 25 in November -- and the New Rochelle Public Library Foundation is throwing a special birthday bash for the beloved New Rochelle institution.

On Saturday, May 20th the community is invited to a free family-friendly day of fun from 11 am to 1 pm at the Huguenot Children’s Library, 794 North Avenue (corner of Eastchester Road). Organizers are planning music, crafts activities, balloon art, visits from costumed book characters, sidewalk chalk art, and -- of course -- birthday cake and goody bags.

The New Rochelle Public Library Foundation is a nonprofit organization that raises resources and provides advocacy to keep both branches of the New Rochelle Public Library vibrant, up-to-date, and able to serve the diverse needs of the New Rochelle community. For more information about the NRPL Foundation visit the website at www.nrplfoundation.org

About the Huguenot Children’s Library

The Huguenot Children’s Library was built in 1869 as a private home – the city’s first brick residence -- and three generations of the Mahlstedt family lived here, running an ice-cutting business on the pond (now Twin Lakes) behind the house. In 1922 the City of New Rochelle purchased the 40-acre property to build New Rochelle High School and create Huguenot Park. The brick house was donated to the City and became the Huguenot branch of the New Rochelle Public Library. For 70 years it served the community, but in 1992 the city faced a financial crisis and the decision was made to close the branch.

Within months a suspicious fire had damaged the abandoned building, leaving a gaping hole in the first floor ceiling, and graffiti covered the walls: The building became a neighborhood eyesore, along with the neglected adjacent playground. There was talk of razing the site for a parking lot.

In 1993 a determined group of concerned citizens came together to write a different ending for the story of the little pink house. They proposed turning the abandoned library building into a children’s library, with books, games and computers selected just for youngsters, and to refurbish the playground at Huguenot Park. They named their group the Partnership for the Huguenot Children’s Library, in recognition that the effort would require collaboration between the private and public sectors. With help from the City of New Rochelle and a grants from the Saturn Corporation, the parents’ group renovated the playground in June, 1993, then over the next four years the PHCL raised more than $350,000 and gutted and renovated the abandoned building adjacent to the park, creating Westchester County’s only freestanding children’s library.

The all-volunteer PHCL construction crew began demolition in the fall of 1996, spending the next year completely renovating the building. On November 22, 1997 the Huguenot Children’s Library opened its doors. The non-profit PHCL continued to raise the money needed to operate the library until June, 2003, when the citizens of New Rochelle voted to fully fund both the main branch and the HCL.

Over the summer of 2006 the playground at Huguenot Park was renovated again, with new landscaping and new equipment provided by the non-profit Jack Robert Young Foundation, in collaboration with the PHCL and the City of New Rochelle. The park’s handicapped-accessible playground, Jack’s Friendship Garden, is one of only two purpose-built playgrounds for disabled children in Westchester County. It is named in memory of the infant son of Donna and Bob Young.

In 2019 the Partnership for the Huguenot Children’s Library became part of the New Rochelle Public Library Foundation.