D. H. Hill Library
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D.H. Hill Library is the main library at North Carolina State University. It is the third building to house NCSU Libraries, following Brooks Hall and Holladay Hall. The current building, situated on the Hillsborough Street edge of North Campus[1], is the result of four stages of construction, and houses the majority of the 3.6 million volumes in NC State's collection.
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[edit] Location
The library is situated on Hillsborough Street, the north edge of campus, however the north entrances are currently closed. The main entrances are on the campus side, integrated into University Plaza (the Brickyard).[1]
[edit] History of D.H. Hill
[edit] Naming
D.H. Hill is named after Daniel Harvey Hill, Jr., once part-time NC State librarian, and president of NC State in 1908. He was the son of the scholar and notable Confederate Army General Daniel Harvey Hill.
[edit] Overview
D.H. Hill was built in four major stages, from 1953-1990:
- "East Wing" completed in 1953 and renovated in 2007.
- "Erdahl-Cloyd Student Union", completed 1954, now Erdahl-Cloyd (West) Wing and The Atrium.
- "Bookstack North", completed in 1972, a 10-story shelving area.
- "Bookstack South", completed in 1990, an 11-story shelving area fronting the Brickyard.
[edit] Details
D.H. Hill was built as a replacement for Brooks Hall, a rather smaller building on North Campus. The first wing of the building, now known as the "East Wing", was opened in 1953. Brooks Hall was occupied by the School of Design. A year after the opening of the East Wing, the Erdahl-Cloyd Union was built. In 1972, the student union was moved into Talley Student Center, and the Erdahl-Cloyd Union became the west wing of the library. It was connected to the east wing by a new 10-story (numbered G,1-9) Bookstack North tower, adding space for 1,000,000 volumes. The completion coincided with the 83rd anniversary of NC State's founding. Finally, the current library was completed with the addition of 11-story (numbered B,G,1-9) Bookstack South tower in 1990, adding space for another 500,000 volumes.
[edit] Renovations
The library's East Wing underwent a large-scale renovation targeted at creating a study/work area with technology integration. The newly renovated wing was reopened on March 12, 2007 after a large ribbon-cutting ceremony.[2] [3]
[edit] Tenants
[edit] NCSU Libraries
Currently, D.H. Hill is occupied primarily by NCSU Libraries. However, the library's Atrium wing houses an outlier of University Dining. University Dining also maintains the "Hill of Beans" coffee shop in the library's lobby. Also housed within D.H. Hill are the servers for NC LIVE, a library cooperative formed by four communities of interest (COIs) -- public libraries, community colleges, the state's university system, and members of the North Carolina Association of Independent Colleges and Universities -- which make digital resources available to North Carolina residents.
[edit] The Atrium
The Atrium is a group of quick-service restaurants, accepting on-campus meal plans, "board bucks", Visa, Mastercard and cash. It is open on weekdays from 7:30am-3pm, but is not open on weekends. The general public is welcome to the Atrium, which is located on the bottom level of the Erdahl-Cloyd wing.
The restaurants at the Atrium include:
- Chick-Fil-A - This CFA serves a limited menu, but won an award for most sales on any college campus in 2005.
- Li'l Dino's - sandwiches and wraps.
- Toppers - various dishes.
- Freshens - smoothies and ice cream.
- Paisano's Pizzeria - personal pan pizzas.
There is limited seating inside and outside the Atrium itself. This seating tends to be very full at peak lunch hours. The library proper and the Atrium are not internally connected.
[edit] Hill of Beans
The Hill of Beans coffee shop is inside the library itself, near the main entrance to the Brickyard. It serves specialty coffee beverages, as well as snack and pastry items. It, like the Atrium, accepts Visa, Mastercard, cash, board bucks, and meal plans.
[edit] Inside D.H. Hill
[edit] Hours
During the week, (Monday-Thursday) D.H. Hill is open 24 hours a day. On Friday and Saturday, the Library closes at 10pm. On Saturdays and Sundays, the Library opens at 9am. 24-hour service resumes Sunday night.
[edit] Study Areas
D.H. Hill provides computers and study space for approximately 5% of the 30,000 member student body. Guidelines for the University of North Carolina system call for seating of up to 20% of the student body. The necessary expansion this entails will probably be split between D.H. Hill itself, and a new Centennial Campus Library, which has been proposed.[1] Despite this perceived service gap, D.H. Hill generally accommodates the needs of students with loaner laptops, group study and individual study areas on several floors.
[edit] Collections
NCSU Libraries houses its main collections in D.H. Hill. Other collections are stored in four small satellite libraries within departments, and a Satellite Shelving Facility, which mostly houses older journals and periodical publications. D.H. Hill includes the majority of the 3.6 million volumes in NCSU's collection, as well as being designated a Federal and state document repository.
D.H. Hill and the NCSU Library system's strengths are in keeping with the strengths of the University itself, namely engineering, science, agriculture, veterinary medicine, and mathematics. However, the Libraries also have strengths in architecture, design, and other somewhat less technical fields.
The 3.6 million volume collection is the smallest among the "Big 3" Universities in the Triangle Research Libraries Network -- the other two library systems being Duke and UNC - Chapel Hill.[2][3] One of the Library's focuses is to acquire more volumes in areas that it is not strong in, in order to increase its base of knowledge.
[edit] Statistics
D.H. Hill is ranked 29th out of 112 academic research libraries, and is a member of several library groups, including the Association of Research Libraries, the Center for Research Libraries, and the Digital Library Federation. It was the first library to receive the Association of College and Research Libraries' Excellence in Academic Libraries Award, and was the recipient in 2003 of the American Library Association's Library of the Future award. Currently NCSU Libraries employs 288 people, of which 124 are librarians or other professionals. D.H. Hill alone circulates one million volumes per year.
[edit] Sources
- ^ a b Campus Map (North Campus)
- ^ Technician Online: Library Opens Revamped East Wing (March 13, 2006)
- ^ NCSU: Library Renovation
