In the early 1950s Mrs. Irene Hendrick is shown at her desk in the public area of the “Colored Library” at #39 S. Market Street in the YMI (Young Men’s Institute) Building. The library branch for the black citizens of Asheville opened in 1927. The name was changed to Market Street Branch of City Libraries in 1951. Mrs. Hendrick was the first librarian for the branch library and continued as supervisor there until the branch was closed in 1966, after the library system desegregated in 1962.
