Wiktionary
n. A library provided essentially as a public service rather than as a commercial venture.
WordNet
n. a nonprofit library maintained for public use
Wikipedia
For public libraries in North America, see Public libraries in North America. A public library is a library that is accessible by the general public and is generally funded from public sources, such as taxes. It is operated by librarians and library paraprofessionals, who are also civil servants.
There are five fundamental characteristics shared by public libraries. The first is that they are generally supported by taxes (usually local, though any level of government can and may contribute); they are governed by a board to serve the public interest; they are open to all, and every community member can access the collection; they are entirely voluntary in that no one is ever forced to use the services provided; and they provide basic services without charge.
Public libraries exist in many countries across the world and are often considered an essential part of having an educated and literate population. Public libraries are distinct from research libraries, school libraries, and other special libraries in that their mandate is to serve the general public's information needs rather than the needs of a particular school, institution, or research population. Public libraries also provide free services such as preschool story times to encourage early literacy, quiet study and work areas for students and professionals, or book clubs to encourage appreciation of literature in adults. Public libraries typically allow users to borrow books and other materials, i.e., take off the premises temporarily; they also have non-circulating reference collections and provide computer and Internet access to patrons.
Public Library is the seventh studio album by The Burning Hell. It takes songwriter Mathias Kom's story songs further than ever before, and all tracks have been given a literary classification. The band recorded the album in the middle of a UK tour in Ramsgate at Big Jelly Studios. The album was mixed by Jeff McMurrich at 6 Nassau in Toronto, and mastered by Bo Kondren at Calyx in Berlin.
Usage examples of "public library".
Then Little White Walking Sam becomes Little White Running Sam: he runs across the lawn, he sets the Briggs Avenue Branch of the St Louis Public Library to his back and runs, but it doesn't matter how fast he runs because he can't outrun the taste of red licorice on his tongue and down his throat, sweet and sugar-slimy, and no matter how fast he runs the Library Wolf of course runs with him, the Library Wolf is just behind his shoulder where he cannot see, and the Library Wolf is whispering Come with me, son.
The telephone company is just around the comer, and that building across the street is the public library.
Gavin, childless and alone save for the money her husband had left in trust for her, the money she would never own but only use until she died, and all of it out of her own choice and a book she had, by chance, found in the public library forty years ago, the same book that now lay on the kitchen counter beside the still-steaming pot and the tin colander and the cup that would make her one with Mrs.
It's not often you see the New York Public Library imported to Venice pier.
The Friends of the Library had erected a display of a huge book made entirely of various colored flowers in front of the public library.
After school that afternoon, I set out for the Stoneybrook Public Library.
Kishi is the director of the Stoneybrook Public Library, and she's guided us through this kind of research more than once.
After he finished telling the librarian how his microfilm files ought to be organized and how they ought to switch from microfilm to microcard and how in spite of everything the New York Public Library wasn't such a bad place to research, he got down to work.
DeCandido of the New York Public Library (Research) Preservation Division, for assistance with the descriptions of papermaking.
Robert Neville's footsteps thudded hollowly up the marble steps of the Los Angeles Public Library.