Mona, Campus:

In 1944 the Secretary of State for the Colonies appointed a Commission on Higher Education in the Colonies. The West Indies Committee of the Commission, under the chairmanship of Sir James Irvine, recommended the foundation of a University College of the West Indies to be placed in Jamaica and outlined in their report a plan for its establishment. The site chosen for the College was at Mona in the Parish of St. Andrew, rented from the Government of Jamaica at a pepper corn rental for 999 years. Work began on the site in October 1949. The College Library was first established in April 1948 and like the College, it opened its doors to its first readers in the following October with one Librarian, two clerical assistants but no books. The cantonments known as Gibraltar Camp purchased from the War Office were temporary wooden huts converted to house the library, chapel, lecture rooms, etc. until the new buildings were completed. The Library transferred to the new permanent buildings in May 1952.

The College Library building is situated at the very centre of the buildings and grounds that comprise the College and the original Library building was built in the shape, roughly, of a sanserif upper-case L. The Library was later extended in 1957 and consisted of a projection of the original L so that the building in its entirety is now in the form of a sanserif upper-case T. This extension increased the Library’s accommodation for 270 readers and 200,000 volumes. During the academic years 1961-9962 the University became and independent institution and the library having been developed as, the library of a university, became so in name and in fact.

St Augustine, Campus:

The University Library at St Augustine has developed from one of the oldest special libraries in the West Indies. This was the library of the Imperial College of Tropical Agriculture established in 1922. From 1960, when the Imperial College was merged with the University College of the West Indies, the scope of the library’s collections and services as well as its clientele has widened considerably. Having begun in one small room in the first Agriculture building it finally occupied the whole ICTA administration building before the new library was built.

This new building – a four-storey air-conditioned structure – was a gift from the Trinidad and Tobago Government to the University, made possible under the terms of special assistance by the United States government. It is strategically located at the centre of the JFK building complex and was one of the largest and most modern library buildings in the West Indies. It was completed and occupied in time for the beginning of the academic year in October 1969 with a seating capacity of 400 readers and shelving for 150,000 volumes.

Cave Hill, Campus:

The University Library at Cave Hill was opened on Wednesday October 16, 1963 with a stock of about 50 books at its temporary quarters on the Fair Ground outside Bridgetown. At the end of 1966 the Library moved to a commodious, new, air-conditioned building at the University’s new site at Cave Hill.