🏢 Dallas Public Library — Dallas, Texas

J. Erik Jonsson Central Library

An eight-story modernist tower across from City Hall where you can stand a few feet from a 1776 Declaration of Independence broadside and a 1623 Shakespeare First Folio.

📖 About J. Erik Jonsson Central Library

The J. Erik Jonsson Central Library is the flagship of the Dallas Public Library system, a ten-level building (eight stories above ground and two below) that opened in the early 1980s to replace the old central library and anchor downtown's Government District at 1515 Young Street. Named for J. Erik Jonsson, a co-founder of Texas Instruments and former mayor of Dallas who led the ten-year private fundraising drive to build it, the modernist tower was designed to echo the nearby Dallas City Hall directly across the plaza. Its seventh floor is the library's crown jewel: it displays an original Dunlap broadside of the Declaration of Independence printed on the night of July 4, 1776 — one of roughly 25 surviving copies and the only original held west of the Mississippi. Nearby sits an original copy of Shakespeare's First Folio, printed in 1623, the volume without which nearly half of his plays might have been lost. As the system's main branch it also houses the Dallas History and Archives Division and serves as the reference and research heart of the city.

⭐ What makes this branch special

• Displays a 1776 Dunlap Declaration of Independence broadside — the only original west of the Mississippi
• Original 1623 Shakespeare First Folio on view on the seventh floor
• Eight-story modernist building named for TI co-founder and former mayor J. Erik Jonsson
• Home to the Dallas History and Archives Division

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