A grant of $10,000 was made to Bedford by the Carnegie Foundation in 1907, but the library building was not constructed until ten years later. Frank E. Wetherell (sometimes listed as Wetherell and Gage, at other times as Wetherell and Harrison) designed a number of Carnegie libraries in Iowa from the early 1900s through the teens. The design of this parapeted building with a gable seems to look back to Dutch and Flemish architecture of the seventeenth century. The stucco walls are contained by the brick base, corner quoining, horizontal brick bands, and windows surrounded by brick frames. The centrally placed entrance pavilion displays a classically framed door, and above this is a small pedimented stone frame within which is the name of the building.