Celebrating the Library's Centennial

In the fall of 1911, the newly formed Andover-Harvard Theological Library opened its doors for the use of faculty, students, staff, alumni, and local clergy. In his annual report, Dean William Wallace Fenn reported this event in a single sentence: "In accordance with our agreement with Andover Theological Seminary, the libraries of the two institutions have been consolidated into the Andover-Harvard Theological Library." One hundred years later we celebrated the anniversary of the opening of the library with several events in October: a lecture, a book sale, a historical walking tour, and an open house.

Watch a video of the Centennial Lecture, "Choosing Words over Bullets," by Gustav Niebuhr, Professor of Religion and Media at Syracuse University, former religion journalist for The New York Times, regular contributor to the Washington Post's "On Faith" website, and author of Beyond Tolerance: Searching for Interfaith Understanding in America (Viking, 2008). The lecture was given on Thursday, October 6, 5:15-6:30 pm.

See a slideshow of historical photos of the library.

Read a short history of the library and its predecessors.

Browse the list of Community Book Picks, collected mostly from visitors at the library's Centennial Open House on October 27, 2011 (Adobe Reader required).