Libraries - Director's Office

Ever since the University of Maryland at College Park opened in 1859 as the Maryland Agricultural College, the University has had a library. The Agricultural College began in a single large building which housed dormitories, the mess hall, faculty and administrative office, and lecture halls. The library, called the reading room, was located on the second floor. Students and faculty, who supported the reading room, stocked it with agricultural periodicals and local newspapers. By the 1880s, the reading room was becoming more like a traditional library. According to the 1886-1887 college catalog, the library held not only agricultural periodicals and newspapers, bu also "several hundred valuable books" which supported reference in the Agriculture and General Science departments. In addition to the reading rooms' collection, the New Mercer Literary Society, a student group, owned a collection of 1,500 volumes, and many professors had private libraries.

As enrollment in the Maryland Agricultural College increased, the College expanded both in number of buildings and in number of academic departments. In 1894, the College built a two-story building which housed the gymnasium on the first floor and the library on the second floor. This building, located to the north of Morrill Hall, later became the Dean of Women's building and was torn down in the late 1950s.

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