The University’s library system can seem massive and foreboding. But students armed with a general idea of which library is used for what, the help of the friendly staff and some online research tools can use the libraries quite easily.

According to the library system’s Web site, the University has the 17th largest research library in North America, with more than 5.7 million books, 45,000 magazine and journal subscriptions and thousands of microforms, government documents and maps.

All this information is housed in five buildings and 11 branch sites.

The first thing to do is point a Web browser to the library’s Web site, www.lib.umn.edu.

From there, helpful online tools and guides show where to find a particular book or magazine.

From the Web it is also possible to search and browse periodical indexes, some of them full-text such as the periodical database Lexis-Nexis.

If you can’t get to the Internet, you can narrow down which library your document would be in.

West Bank

ïWilson Library contains humanities and social science collections.

Wilson Library will be offering orientation tours for new students for a month after the first day of fall classes.

ïThe Law Library contains law documents.

ïThe Elmer L. Andersen Library has the University’s special collections and archives.

East Bank

ïWalter Library normally houses the science and engineering collections, but the building is closed for renovations until fall 2001. Until then, the collection is being housed in the Norris Gym and Andersen Library.

ïThe Bio-Medical Library contains collections focusing on medicine and public health.

St. Paul Campus

ïMagrath Library houses biology and other miscellaneous collections.