Industrialist and Philanthropist

Andrew Carnegie was born in 1835 at Dunfermline in Scotland. The advent of the power loom and a general economic downturn reduced the family to poverty and in 1848 they emigrated to the United States, settling at Allegheny in Pennsylvania. Young Andrew began to work at the age of twelve as a bobbin boy in a cotton factory.

Carnegie was hard working, shrewd, far sighted and fortunate. As he made more and more money he invested it first of all in railroads and then in iron and steel. He overlooked no new discovery that could improve America's steel production, and by 1890, thanks largely to his endeavours, the United States became the world's largest steel producer.

Ten years later Carnegie Steel had annual profits of $40m, of which his personal share was $25m. Then, in the following year, this amazing man sold his company for $250m dollars and devoted the rest of his life to philanthropic activities.

For Carnegie was far more than just another multi millionaire. He was a social reformer as well. His beliefs, which came to be called the "Gospel of Wealth", were briefly that a man who has accumulated great wealth is obviously an exceptional person; it is his duty to use his surplus wealth for the improvement of mankind. "A man who dies rich, dies disgraced" he snapped. And he proceeded to put his ideas into practice by distributing his own surplus wealth of $350m.

As education is one of the keys to success, Carnegie funded the erection of many Public Libraries. By 1913 the Carnegie United Kingdom Thrust had provided 37 libraries in this country. The idea was that the local community, freed from the cost of building, would provide books and maintenance. Alas, things don't always turn out like that. Some libraries were used simply for meetings, some were left empty, some were vandalised. In one case, the caretaker simply burned the books so that he wouldnt be bothered by readers.

The Carnegie Library at Lismore, a fine building of redbrick and terracotta, was erected in 1910 and has served the community faithfully ever since.