Zimmerman Library

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Quick Facts

• Location: 35°05′09″N 106°37′17″W
• Address: 1900 Roma Ave., NE.
• Significance: History of Albuquerque, History of New Mexico,
• Designation: National Register of Historic Places
• Opening Date: April 1, 1928
• Open to the public: Yes, Part of the University of New Mexico Campus

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MOST OF THIS TEXT IS NOT MINE, SOOO JUST IMAGINE QUOTES AROUND THE WHOLE THING RN) Zimmerman Library is a mainstay of New Mexican University students since 1928. Books, magazines, newspapers, and scholarly journals make up a substantial portion of the collections, but many other formats of information are included. Microforms, maps, DVDs, and posters are vital parts of the research and instructional process at UNM. Zimmerman Lbrary now not only houses these resources, but also modern and contorversial art, as well as a Starbucks. ***

Art

Located in the West Wing in what was once the main lobby, Kenneth Adams’ Three Peoples Murals were completed in 1939. Adams, the last artist to join the Taos Society of Artists, came to the University as Artist in Residence through a grant from the Carnegie Corporation.

Adams was given strict guidnce in the creation of his murals, so the controversial creation of this art is not necessarily his fault. President James F. Zimmerman stated purpose for the murals was so that they would “represent each of the three major cultures in New Mexico and their contributions to civilization.”

In the 1970s the piece was twice vandalized, and in both instances the vandalism involved paint being applied to the white person depicted. The creation and installation of this piece might be indicative of the universities continually flippant attitude towards racism.

Reds, Blacks & Golds: Fractured Square Series Installed 2011, Donna Loraine Contractor’s series is the most recent artwork in Zimmerman Library. Located in the public study space on the eastern wall of the first floor, this piece has greeted studying for a varitey of subjects with it’s warm colors and interesting design asthetic.

On the National Regisrty

The Zimmerman Library is eligible for listing in the National Register at the state level, and the library is among the largest and finest works of New Mexico master architect John Gaw Meem, who designed a state-of-the-art academic library in the Spanish Pueblo-Revival style. With a fireproof stacks tower and reading rooms reminiscent of the interiors of Spanish mission churches, the building was funded by New Deal programsthe PWA and WPA.

The property also includes the Castetter Succulent Garden and the WPA Grove of evergreens, both planted on the west side of the building when the library was built from 1936 to 1938.

The east façade of the Meem library was mostly removed to make way for an addition in 1966, but Meem had planned for an addition to be added to the east façade as the library’s holdings increased. Though twice the size of the Meem design, the additions are inconsequential for National Register eligibility because they were planned so as not to alter the west, north, and elevations, historic landscape features, and the original interior design, including the murals and decorative arts.

Construction

John Gaw Meem planned the Zimmerman Library according to standard library practices so that the building could be expanded as the library’s collections increased. Meem explained that, “the building is so designed that future additions to both stack space and reading room space can be easily added when the requirements make such additional space necessary.”1 Historian David Kammer stated that, “while some of the public and institutional as well as ecclesiastical buildings that Meem designed have received additions, these additions should not necessarily preclude the building’s National Register eligibility if the original plans anticipated additions and those additions were sensitively rendered.” In an article published soon after the first library addition was completed, Meem writes that the addition to the library was “very successful, particularly in evoking certain basic elements of the style, such as flat roofs, terraced masses, preponderance of walls over openings, the slightly battered earth-colored walls and softened outlines. . .”

Architectural historian Bainbridge Bunting was so impressed by the Zimmerman Library additions that he wrote in Albuquerque Magazine: “Zimmerman Library demonstrates what excellent results are obtained when architects are humble enough to recognize value in a predecessor’s work and try to design in harmony with it.”

Style

The Spanish-Pueblo Revival-style library included a flat roof and utilizes a reinforced-concrete frame, load-bearing brick, and structural clay tile. The exterior is finished with battered concrete covered with stucco. The foundation and footings are poured concrete and brick. The ceilings are poured concrete that is three feet, five inches thick. The stacks tower includes steel I-beam reinforcements encased in concrete at the perimeter. The tower floors are reinforced with 18- inch steel I-beams. The tower, the dominant feature of the building, rises from a flat-roofed twostory center. The main entrance on the west side is flanked by two roughly symmetrical wings, with three additional wings projecting to the north, east, and south. The large massing of the stacks tower is relieved by groups of vertical windows containing colored-concrete spandrels with Art Deco-style Indian designs. The library measures 61,780 square feet.

The beams in the Great Room are constructed of poured concrete encased in carved wood planks. Four recessed bays above the card catalogs contain a series of four murals by Taos artist Kenneth Miller Adams. The five projecting reading rooms were designed are supported by hand-carved vigas and corbels. These reading rooms wings, which are one-and-a-half-stories with open plans, display the heavy massing and large, multi-paned windows that provide natural light. The ceilings of the reading rooms incorporate non-structural Spanish-Pueblo Revival-style viga-andlatilla roof construction. In the south reading room, also called the Spanish Room, the ceiling is plastered.

When Spain controlled what is now the southwestern United States, the Spanish officially banned international trade of all kinds. After Mexico gained its independence from Spain in 1821, the Mexicans lifted the ban and opened the area to both commercial and cultural exchange. The Santa Fe Trail, which spanned 1,200 miles from Franklin, Missouri to Santa Fe, New Mexico passing through deserts, mountains, and forests along its route, became the main means of transportation to and from the area.

In 1908 the rail company ATSF completed a second tunnel under Raton Pass to handle increased traffic, but developments in rail around the West signaled the decline of Raton Pass as a major rail corridor. First, ATSF finished the Belen Cutoff in central New Mexico, giving the railroad an easier route. Raton Pass continued to be used for passengers, but all long-haul trains now took the Belen Cutoff route. In 1908–9 New Mexico used convict labor to build a new highway that crossed the Colorado border near Raton Pass, further reducing traffic through the area.

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Location

Zimmerman Library, the main library for the University of New Mexico, is located in the center of campus in Albuquerque in Bernalillo County, New Mexico. The Spanish-Pueblo Revivalstyle library is one of the largest and finest buildings by New Mexico master architect John Gaw Meem. Constructed between 1936 and 1938 with PWA and WPA funds, the library is organized around the Great Hall, with three reading rooms projecting from the north end of the hall and two on the south end. A nine-story fire-proof stacks tower with vertical bands of windows and decorative spandrel panels was designed to hold 225,000 volumes. Meem infused the SpanishPueblo Revival design and interior furnishings and fixtures with Native American and Hispanic designs by local craftsmen. Four murals in the Great Hall depict the Anglo, Hispanic, and Native American cultures in New Mexico. The nomination includes the Castetter Succulent Garden and the WPA Grove of evergreens. The east side of the library had been planned for expansion, and in 1966 the Albuquerque firm Ferguson, Stevens, Mallory and Pearl completed a three-story addition. In 1973, Dean, Hunt, Krueger and Associates completed a second major addition on the east side of the 1966 addition. In 1991-1993, the Albuquerque architect Van H. Gilbert with the Boston firm of Shepley, Bulfinch, Richardson, and Abbott remodeled the interior, including spaces in the Meem library.

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Nearby

• Buildings designed by John Gaw Meems
• Capulin Mountain National Monument, a symmetrical volcanic cone rising 1,500 feet, lies 32 miles to the southeast.
• View directions on Google Maps

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Related People

• Information about John Gaw Meem
• Information about UNM President James Zimmerman

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Bibliography

• Zimmerman Library, National Register of Historic Places Program, Department of the Interior, #3 & 120, New Mexico State Records Center and Archives (NMSRCA), Santa Fe, New Mexico.
• William Zimmerman Photograph Collection, University of New Mexico Center for Southwest Research
• NPS Form: National Register of Historic PLaces, Zimmerman Library, Bernalillo County, New Mexico, #16000549. 2016