The Tomkins Cove Public Library was once the Tomkins Cove Union School. Before this there was only a small wooden building that served as a schoolhouse but was only open for a brief period each year.

Calvin Tomkins and his brother Daniel came to the hamlet now known as Tomkins Cove in 1838. In 1859, they founded the Tomkins' Lime Company. Calvin Tomkins built a life for himself in Tomkins Cove and decided to give back to the community by building a rare poured concrete school built and established in 1874. (In fact, if you look carefully on the front of the building you can still faintly see the letters as well as the inscription "Erected by Calvin Tomkins 1874.") There are only a few known examples of this type of building in the area. One other was his "gothic" mansion "Boulderberg Manor" also constructed with poured concrete in 1858.

Former school children, the last of which used the building in the 1950s, remember fondly the building and the teachers who influenced their lives. In the early days they walked to school cutting through the woods as far away as Buckberg Mountain. Boys and girls had separate entrances. The bell still resides in the cupola and could be rung by the principal or caretaker on the first floor as a long rope ran all the way down from the top. On the second floor you can still see the original blackboards that were in the classrooms.

In the 1950s, when schools were in the process of combining, and closing, including the Tomkins Cove Union School, a concerned group of citizens formed a committee to turn the building into a library. A provisional Charter was issued on April 26, 1963 and the permanent Charter on September 27, 1968. Since then, it has been known as the Tomkins Cove Public Library.