As of 2000, California had 171 public library jurisdictions and 52 public library systems with 179,000 public libraries that held a total of 66,193,000 volumes or 1.9 volumes per capita, with a circulation of 165,950,000. California has three of the largest public library systems in the nation, along with some of the country's finest private collections. The Los Angeles Public Library System had 5,811,492 volumes in 1998; the San Francisco Public Library, 2,137,618; and the San Diego Public Library, 2,670,375. Public library income came to $830,267,000 in 2000, including $5,811,169 in federal grants and $70,572,695 in state grants. While California's public libraries had the 2nd-largest income of all states, spending per capita was mediocre.
Outstanding among academic libraries is the University of California's library at Berkeley, with its Bancroft collection of western Americana. Stanford's Hoover Institution has a notable collection of research materials on the Russian Revolution, World War I, and worldwide relief efforts thereafter. Numerous rare books, manuscripts, and documents are held in the Huntington Library in San Marino.
California has nearly 576 museums and over 50 public gardens. Outstanding museums include the California Museum of Science and Industry, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and Natural History Museum, all in Los Angeles; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, and Asian Art Museum of San Francisco; the San Diego Museum of Man; the California State Indian Museum in Sacramento; the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena; and the J. Paul Getty Museum at Malibu. Among historic sites are Sutter's Mill, northeast of Sacramento, where gold was discovered in 1848, and a restoration of the Mission of San Diego de Alcala, where in 1769 the first of California's Franciscan missions was established. San Diego has an excellent zoo, and San Francisco's Strybing Arboretum and Botanical Gardens has beautiful displays of Asian, Mediterranean, and California flora.