Our Favorite College Libraries in Honor of World Book Day

April 23rd: World Book Day

Happy World Book Day! World Book Day is an annual event established by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) on April 23, 1995. The date was selected as it is the anniversary of both the death of William Shakespeare and Spanish writer Inca Garcilaso de la Vega. In its honor, today we’ll be highlighting some of the most notable campus libraries in the United States. 

  • The Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library

    • Location: Yale University

    • Year opened: 1963

    • Notable features: The Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library boasts a unique architectural design that houses one of the world’s largest collections of rare books. The marble walls, which are white on the building’s facade, create an amber glow in the interior of the library. This lighting prevents the rare books and archives inside from being damaged.

  • Bapst Library

    • Location: Boston College

    • Year opened: 1925

    • Notable features: Considered a historic landmark and one of the most beautiful libraries in the country, the Bapst Library includes stunning Gothic architecture and colorful stained glass–enough of it that you can even take an audio tour. It holds over 50,000 volumes related to art.

  • James B. Hunt Jr. Library

    • Location: North Carolina State University

    • Year opened: 2013

    • Notable features: A comparatively new library, the James B. Hunt Jr. Library cost about $115 million to build. It includes BookBot, a robotics book retrieval system comprised of robots that are over 50 feet tall and able to scan, sort, and store books.

  • Linderman Library

    • Location: Lehigh University

    • Year opened: 1878

    • Notable features: The stately Linderman Library’s Rare Book Collection includes copies of Charles Darwin’s “Origin of Species.” It has had several renovations since its opening to add greater storage and study space, but its iconic Victorian Rotunda (circa 1878) and Grand Reading Room (circa 1929) have both been left intact.

  • The Cook Legal Research Library

    • Location: University of Michigan

    • Year opened: 1931

    • Notable features: The picturesque Cook Legal Research Library has reading rooms that can sit over hundreds of students and a large collection of historic legal papers.

  • The Harry Elkins Widener Memorial Library

    • Location: Harvard University

    • Year opened: 1915

    • Notable features: The Widener Library is home to a staggering 3.5 million books (in over one hundred different languages) spread out over ten levels and fifty-seven miles’ worth of shelves. Its Harry Elkins Widener Collection houses one of the world’s few perfect Gutenberg Bibles, which was the subject of an unsuccessful theft attempt in 1969.

Did you know that college library books were once so rare, they were chained to desks? We’ve come a long way since. Happy reading!