The California State Library’s main collection is back at home in Sacramento’s 1928 Library and Courts Building after a lengthy vacation in a suburban warehouse. The historic building needed extensive renovations to render it earthquake-safe, and the construction work that began in 1997 necessitated the removal of all the library’s books. The seismic retrofitting included installation of modern climate-control and fire-sprinkler systems and compact shelving.
The reinstallation of the collection, which began in March, was completed June 20, according to the June 21 Sacramento Bee. In all, the materials occupy almost 150,000 linear feet of shelf space. The library is a closed-stack facility that is frequently used for urgent legislative research, so the librarians were happy to have the books back on-site. While the library was closed, the staff made two trips daily to the warehouse to retrieve requested books.
Posted June 26, 2000.