A Great Library on the Prairie: The History, Design, and Growth of the University of Illinois Library

Abstract

The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign Library stands today as one of the largest publicly funded libraries in the United States, providing information access for research and discovery to over 50,000 students, faculty, and staff as well as to members of the community at large. The library developed and grew as the university itself grew, becoming an architectural manifestation of those it serves. Originally designed by a team of University leaders, librarians, and architects for the pedagogies and information needs of the early twentieth century, the main library building, a neo-Georgian structure dating from 1926, supplemented by an imaginatively designed adjacent underground library for undergraduates in the late 1960s, has adapted to emerging information technologies and patron use through additions and changes in service models over the decades, ensuring its continuing relevancy to its patrons and its place as the heart of the university.