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The Main Library is a library on the campus of the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign in Urbana, Illinois. Built in 1924, the library replaced Altgeld Hall, which had become too small for the university's collections. Architect Charles A. Platt designed the Georgian Revival building, one of several on the campus which he designed in the style. The Main Library includes the Main Stacks, which house approximately 5 million items of the Library’s collection. The second floor of the Main Library houses: the Circulation Desk, the service point and entrance for the Main Stacks; the Information Desk; and the Reference Reading Room, which provides quiet study space, technology, and reference resources. The Main Library is also home to multiple departmental libraries, as well as the University Archives and The Rare Book & Manuscript Library.

The library was added to the National Register of Historic Places on August 11, 2000.

History
Prior to the construction of the Main Library, the University's collections were housed in Library Hall (now known as Altgeld Hall). Although Library Hall underwent an expansion in the early 1910s, the collection continued to grow, causing university leaders to advocate for the construction of a new and larger library building. In 1912, University President Edmund J. James proposed that the Library should accumulate "at least a million books as rapidly as possible..." and that the state "...spend a million dollars to build a new building to house the collection." In 1921, architect Charles A. Platt was contracted to work on a new campus plan, which included a larger library building. Platt's design for the new library building was in the Georgian Revival style, aesthetically connecting the Library with the other South Campus buildings Platt designed during this period.

Construction on the Main Library began in 1923, with the library opening for service in 1926 with 649,924 volumes. Construction was not fully completed until 1929, when the Main Library was dedicated by University President David Kinley. The Library's one-millionth volume was added to the collection in 1935. The Main Library was designed in a U-Shape, where the library building wraps "around the central book stacks on three sides," allowing for the growth and expansion of the Library in the future. In line with Platt's vision, the stacks have been expanded four times since the original construction to accommodate the Library's growing collection; respectively in 1939, 1957, 1968, and 1982. An off-site storage facility, Oak Street High Density Storage, was opened in 2004 to house items with low circulation history.

Departmental Libraries and Units
The Main Library contains a number of different departmental libraries and service units.


 * Classics Library - The Classics Library, located in room 419A Main Library, is devoted to critical texts on and literature of the Greek and Latin authors, Greek and Latin grammar and lexicography, philology, history, epigraphy, and papyrology. It includes materials that are of interest to researchers in a variety of disciplines, including philosophy, art history, English, modern languages, and history.


 * History, Philosophy, and Newspaper Library - The History, Philosophy, and Newspaper Library (HPNL), located in room 246 Main Library, serves the disciplines of history, philosophy, religious studies, and Jewish studies and any discipline utilizing current and historical primary sources, including newspapers.


 * Illinois History and Lincoln Collections - The Illinois History and Lincoln Collections, located in room 322 Main Library, include printed and manuscript material in the fields of Illinois history and Lincoln studies.


 * International and Area Studies Library - The International and Area Studies Library, located in room 321 Main Library, provides access to interdisciplinary services and collections related to area, international, and global studies in vernacular languages and English.


 * Literatures and Languages Library - The Literatures and Languages Library, located in room 200 Main Library, covers literatures in English and the literatures and languages of North America, Latin America and Western Europe, as well as cinema studies, translation studies, and linguistics. The unit serves the Department of English, Department of Theatre, School of Literatures, Cultures and Linguistics, and the Department of Media and Cinema Studies.


 * Map Library - The Map Library, located in room 418 Main Library, is the University Library’s primary location for cartographic materials including maps, atlases, and Illinois aerial photography; it also is home to texts on cartographic techniques, geographic information science (GIS), remote sensing, and spatial statistics.


 * Rare Book & Manuscript Library - The Rare Book & Manuscript Library of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, located in room 346 Main Library, is one of the largest repositories for rare books and manuscripts in the United States. The collections—nearly half a million volumes and three kilometers of manuscript material—are strong in the broad areas of literature, history, art, theology, philosophy, technology, and the natural sciences.


 * Scholarly Commons - The Scholarly Commons, located in room 306 Main Library, provides services and resources for data and technology intensive research including copyright, data services (including geospatial, textual, and numeric data analysis), digitization, scholarly publishing, and web usability.


 * Social Sciences, Health, and Education Library - SSHEL, located in rooms 100 and 101 Main Library, serves the College of Applied Health Sciences; College of Education; School of Social Work; Graduate School of Library and Information Science; School of Labor and Employment Relations; and social science departments including Departments of American Indian Studies, Anthropology, Asian American Studies, Economics, Gender & Women's Studies, Geography and Geographic Information Science, Political Science, Psychology, and Sociology, as well as interdisciplinary biomedical sciences research.


 * University Archives - The University of Illinois Archives, located in room 146 Main Library, provides access to primary sources relating to the University and its faculty, staff, and students.

The Main Stacks
The Main Stacks houses a general collection of approximately five million volumes. The Circulation Desk and the entrance to the Main Stacks are located on the second floor of the Main Library. The Main Stacks are divided into ten different floors, or decks. Directories and maps are posted throughout the stacks indicating the specific locations of call number ranges. A mobile compact shelving system is utilized in the West Stacks to maximize storage space.

In the interest of preserving an environment conducive for scholarship and research, the Library limits entrance to its Main Bookstacks primarily to faculty, staff, and students currently employed by or enrolled in the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. University faculty, graduate and undergraduate students, and staff are granted entrance upon presentation of a valid I-Card. Unaffiliated residents of Illinois with photo identification may apply for a courtesy borrowing card that will entitle them to have materials retrieved from the Bookstacks for their use.

The Reference Reading Room
A popular location to study since the Main Library opened in 1926, the Reading Room is notable for its high ceilings and beautiful architecture. The Reading Room is located in room 200 on the second floor of the Main Library. The Reading Room contains a large non-circulating collection of the library's print reference materials, such as atlases, almanacs, bibliographies, dictionaries, concordances, indexes and research guides. The collection covers a wide range of subjects and disciplines, with particular strength in biography, the social sciences, literature, languages, and the humanities in general. The room features electrical outlets for laptops and other electronic devices, as well as computer workstations and scanners.The North end of the Reading Room houses the Government Documents collection. Reference Librarians are available for assistance nearby at the Information Desk on the second floor.

Reading Room Windows
The Reference Reading Room features twenty-seven eight-by-sixteen foot windows with tinted glass designs of Renaissance printers' marks. These marks represent prominent printers of the Renaissance from France, Scotland, England, Switzerland, Italy, and the Netherlands. The windows were created by the artist J. Scott Williams in 1926-1927 through a process of painting, staining, firing, and etching.

Bronze Tablets
The Main Library has a wall of Bronze Tablets engraved with students' names who have been awarded University Honors. These tablets can be found in the North-South hallway on the first floor of the Library. The tablets are created on a yearly basis, and date back to 1925.

Statues
The Main Library contains several notable statues. Some of the more visible statues near the Main Library are The Sons and Daughters of Deucalion and Pyrrha, four limestone figures created by the artist Lorado Taft in 1933 and gifted to the University in 1937. These statues were intended to be part of a larger work called The Fountain of Creation, but this project was never completed. The Daughters are located outside the east entrance to the Main Library. The Sons are located nearby on the south side of Foellinger Auditorium.

Taft has two other statues in the Main Library. One is The Pioneers, a bronzed plaster cast created in 1928. This statue depicts a pioneer family, consisting of a man, a wife holding an infant child, and a dog. This statue is located inside the south entrance to the Main Library. The other statue is Dr. Gallaudet and His First Deaf-Mute Pupil, created by Lorado Taft in 1888. This bronzed plaster cast depicts Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet with Alice Cogswell, the girl who inspired Gallaudet's interest in educating the deaf. This statue is located inside the north entrance to the Main Library.

Research Assistance
The Main Library serves researchers of all levels. They can assist with finding information and scholarship across disciplines through reference and instructional services.

Information Desk
Located on the second floor of the Main Library, the Information Desk is the central contact point for all library services. Staff at the Desk provide library users with instruction in the use of online resources, help locating items in the collection, ready reference service, and directional assistance. The Information Desk is staffed at all times when the Main Library is open.