York University (Toronto, Ont.). Libraries

The York University Libraries offered services to students in 1960, but the opening of the Leslie Frost Library on the Glendon campus for the 1963-1964 academic year perhaps marks the official beginning of library service at York. With the establishment of the Keele Street campus in 1965, library service was offered at the Steacie Building (now the Steacie Science Building), and in 1971 the Scott Library, the arts and science library on the Keele Street campus, was opened. The Scott Library contains several smaller libraries within it, including the Sound and Moving Images Library, the Map Library, and Archives and Special Collections.
Other libraries at York include the Administrative Studies Library, which also houses the Government Documents Library, the Osgoode Hall Library and the Steacie Science Library. The Leslie Frost Library continues to serve the Glendon College campus. In the early years of the libraries ' existence, there was a determined effort to build quickly a research and teaching collection. In 1964-1965 the total collections equalled 88,285 volumes, while the total for 1968-1969 was 395,986 volumes. By 1975 the book collections were growing at a rate of 100,000 volumes per year, with a total holding of all forms of material of 1,500,000. By the late 1970s, reduced grants forced the library to cutback on acquisitions, the book collections growing by only 50,000 volumes a year. In 1979 the book holdings equalled 1,000,000 with total holdings of all materials at 2,000,000 items. The rate of growth continued through the 1980s, and by 1989 there were 1,600,000 books of a total collection of 3,500,000 items.
The York University libraries use a centralized administrative structure under the direction of the University Librarian. The departments and branch libraries report through two Associate Librarians. All acquisitions, processing and cataloguing of material is handled by the central library (Scott), with the exceptions of the Law Library and the York archives.

2019/06/11 J. Grant. Creation.