L ocal community arts advocate and founder of the grassroots group Support Fort Worth Art, Wesley Kirk, has fond memories of Fort Worth’s now-shuttered central library. The space, which opened in 1978 at 500 W. 3rd Street, once stretched across two city blocks and served as the city’s cultural and educational anchor for decades.
“I used to go there all the time as a kid,” Kirk tells PaperCity Fort Worth. “I loved it. Even as an adult on the Near Southside, I’d go there to borrow movies and see what new books they had.”
The city sold that building in 2023, citing structural and functionality issues, which left Fort Worth without the kind of central library found in other major cities. One year ago, the city purchased the former home of the Center for Transforming Lives at 512 W. 4th St