Carnegie’s libraries were a major part of the “Great American Library Movement” of that era, said Celeste Ford of the Carnegie Corporation of New York. Before that, she said, there was no widespread public funding via taxes for libraries.

Superior did have a library as early as 1869, two decades before it became a city, Meronek said. But early libraries like that were typically located in a small room and privately funded.

Carnegie’s money built 63 libraries in Wisconsin and 66 in Minnesota. The council doesn’t know exactly how many are still functioning as libraries, though it does maintain a map and list of all of them.

“Many have been repurposed into museums, community centers, offices, event venues and, more rarely, private homes. But there’s no comprehensive record of how many fall into each category,” said Angely Montilla, also of the Carnegie foundation.

Nagel’s home still holds signs of library grandeur: a striking vestibule, gleaming wood floors, 14-foot ceilings on the main floor and 10-foot ceilings on the lower level. The windows around a large room that occupies much of the main floor are also 6 to 8 feet tall.

Nagel, who works in maintenance, installed two furnaces and removed about 4,000 pounds of Styrofoam from the garage roof, which he suspects was for insulation.