The Friends first met in October 2001 with the dream of establishing a library in North Plains that would eventually become part of the Washington County Cooperative Library Services. After a busy year of becoming incorporated, raising money, gathering book donations, purchasing needed equipment, cataloguing and shelving books, the library was opened in February 2003 in a small 590 sq. ft. “closet” at the Jessie Mays Community Center with a completely volunteer staff.

In April 2004, Mr. Wayne Holm proposed to the North Plains City Council constructing a 2,500 sq. ft. building to house the rapidly growing North Plains Public Library in partnership with the Friends. Jointly the project began and a Capital Campaign fund raising got underway. The Friends raised over $500,000 to complete the building, furnish and equip the library. The new library had its grand opening on April 29, 2006.

In 2012, in cooperation with the City of North Plains, the Friends began selling used donated and withdrawn library books through Amazon and EBay using the annex space at the Jessie Mays Community Center .  Using surplus, outdated library computers, a printer, a table and three donated monitors the Friends began selling books online. Books not able to be sold online are saved and sold at the book sale during the annual Garlic Festival.

After several years of successful online sales, the Friends reached maximum storagae capacity in the JMCC annex in 2015. The Friends negotiated with the City for a larger online sales space in an unused vacant house owned by the City, dubbed “The Yellow House”.

The Friends spent the next three months cleaning, painting and installing new lighting in The Yellow House. Once the renovations were complete, the Friends converted the house into a storage space for online sales using donated bookshelves. The Yellow House continues to serve as the base of operations for Friends online sales.

In 2022, the Friends officially transferred ownership of the North Plains Public Library to the City of North Plains. Today, the Friends continue to raise funds to help support the North Plains Public Library.