41-17 Main Street
Polshek Partnership, 1998

The Flushing Branch of the QBPL was Queens’ first public library. Established as the Flushing Library Association in 1858 and open to members as a subscription library, it became a free circulating library in 1869. In 1906, a Carnegie-funded structure designed by Lord & Hewlett in the Georgian Revival style replaced the wood frame building on this site. The Carnegie building was demolished in the mid-1950s and replaced with a Modern style building, completed in 1957. In 1993, that building was demolished to make way for the branch’s latest phase, a sweeping glass and steel structure completed in 1998.