History

October, 15, 1833 - the first Public Library was opened in Petrozavodsk. Olonets Governor A. I. Yakovlev offered to open the library.

January, 2, 1860 - Opening of the Public Library. The library occupied one of the buildings of the Noble Assembly (Blagorodnoye Sobranije) in Circular (Kruglaya) Square. Pavel Nikolaevich Rybnikov was one of the initiators.

1865 - the number of readers reached 105 people, and book stock contained 887 volumes. Rybnikov departured to take the post of Vice-Governor in a small town in Poland, the library gradually ceased to exist and was revived only thanks to a lucky incident.

1870 - Great Prince Alexey visits Petrozavodsk and donates 300 roubles to the City Foundation of Public Library. In honour of this event the newly established library was given the name "Alexeyevskaya". Its catalogue, dating back to 1872, has been preserved. According to the catalogue, the library stock at that time contained 1047 books in different fields of knowledge. Later the library suffered a growing lack of finances and many problems connected with the building it occupied.

1918 - The book stock of the library contained 40000 volumes, but it was destroyed by the fire in the same year.

1919 - A new regional library was established on the basis of libraries of two seminaries and a commercial club.

1941 - 1943 – During the war the library was evacuated to the city of Kem.

1947 – the library was reopened as the State Public Library of Karelian-Finnish SSR.

1959 - the library moved into a new building, designed by K. Gutin. The building is considered to be a monument of culture. The present address is 5, Pushkinskaya Street. It is situated in a historical and cultural part of the city.

1991 - the library gained the status of the National library of the Republic of Karelia (NL RK).

2013 – the library celebrated its 180th anniversary.