Church History Library

The Church History Library in downtown Salt Lake City, Utah houses materials chronicling the history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). This new building opened to the public on June 22, 2009.

A new archives building was originally planned in 1960, as an 11-story home for the offices and libraries of the Church Historian and the Genealogical Society of Utah. The need for such large facilities diminished due to advances in modern document preservation, as well as with the 1963 completion of the Granite Mountain Vault, which had vast storage for genealogical materials. Following the completion of the Church Office Building in 1972, the Church Historian's Office and Church History Library resided in the four floors of the east wing.

In April 2005, plans were announced to construct a new Church History Library to be completed in late 2007. The site was then a Temple Square parking lot, and was the same site as in the 1960 plan, northeast of the intersection of Main and North Temple. This new facility houses the Church History Department (the modern name of the Church Historian's Office) and the church's historical archives. The building was dedicated on June 20, 2009 and became open to the public on June 22 with extended hours, improved technology, assistance staff and additional educational and training programs.

The LDS Church History Library preserves materials related to its history, from the 1820s in upstate New York, to the current day with more than 14 million members around the world. Since 1972, these historical collections have been stored in the LDS Church Office Building in Salt Lake City, but that facility closed in April 2009 to prepare for the move to the Church History Library.

The historical materials of the LDS Church contain rich information about both Mormon history and the development of the western United States. These collections include:

The new 230,000-square-foot (21,000 m²) building provides temperature, humidity, and air quality control for the Church’s historical collections. Materials are stored in two types of archival storage rooms. The 10 main storage rooms are kept at 55 °F (13 °C) with 35 percent relative humidity. There are also two special rooms that will be kept at minus four degrees Fahrenheit for color motion picture films, photographs, and records of special significance.

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