Best libraries in the Midwest?

It's probably safe to assume we all like libraries, so which libraries do you think are the best libraries in the Midwest and why?

You may also talk about a library that's special to you even if you don't think it'd make "the best of" list.

I haven't had an extensive tour of the Midwest library systems, but I have a soft spot for Hennepin County Central in downtown Minneapolis. I don't go there often now since I no longer work downtown, but when I first moved here and couldn't buy many books I spent many hours there wandering the stacks and enjoying the large non-fiction collection. It didn't even matter that at the time they were between the tearing down of the old library building and the construction of the new, and the library was temporarily housed in the most utilitarian, aesthetically unappealing space I've ever seen for a public library.

I have a special place in my heart for the Yorkville (IL) public library. The librarians are awesome - they recommend books that they think my kids and I would like, and occasionally, will even put books on hold for us and then call us that our books are in. It's always a surprise what books we end up with - but the books are always a hit. :D (I guess we check out enough books that they know our tastes. LOL) I have been to bigger libraries with more "goodies" but none of them can top the personal touch of the Yorkville one.

I should say Lane public Library in Butler County Ohio because my wife is on the Board of Directors but my heart belongs to the Cincinnati and Hamilton County Library. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Library_of_Cincinnati_and_Hamilton_County#Hi...

I have to vote for my local library -- Woodbourne Public Library in the Washington-Centerville (Ohio) Library system. It started out in a tiny corner of a shopping center; one had to know it was there. It was very small and the single room was about the size of a McMansion walk-in closet. It has since moved into a real library building and is consistently number one in the country for circulation by size. Believe me, it is not easy to find a parking space at any time any day of the week. However, I am still waiting for my own special chair sponsored by all my overdue fines.

My local library is quite small, but is part of a group that accesses a large chunk of Wisconsin, including Eau Claire, so I can order books on line and pick them up in Rice Lake when they come in. And then there's ILL, of course 8-) My medieval history books, including many in German, come from UW Madison or Milwaukee--they take turns 8-) I would love to go play in their stacks!

When I was in grad school at the U of Minn, I loved the libraries there.

#2 - I have a soft spot for Hennepin County Central in downtown Minneapolis

That was my childhood library!!!! I have vague recollections that they used to have a chair there shaped like a giant baseball glove... unless that was a different MN library... :)

Well I guess I have to say my library The New Rockford Public Library in North Dakota it is in a town of 1,500 people with 1,053 patrons so I think that makes it a great library!

What a great community, susiesharp, to have such a large percentage of library users!

I am blessed to live in Cincinnati and have access to the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County. I am quite well known at my neighborhood branch, and do art projects with the kids a few times a year. At one time, an especially talented librarian knew my card number by heart!

I would have to vote for the Public Library of the City of St. Louis, Missouri. It is a very large place and has a wealth of books from over 100 years.

My second vote would be for the Library at the Biltmore Castle, which is not in the mid-west, but I would just love to have a peak inside some of those thousands of volumes.