Joshua Bates (financier)

A Massachusetts-born banker who made his fortune at Barings in London, Bates gave Boston 50,000 dollars in 1852 on condition the city build a library free to all and provide a building, then gave tens of thousands of books. The Boston Public Library, the first large free municipal library in the United States, opened in 1854, and its main reading room in the McKim building is still called Bates Hall.