The University of Connecticut School of Law’s library has been renamed in honor of the late Connecticut Governor Thomas J. Meskill, at a ceremony at the Law School this afternoon.

Speakers included Gov. M. Jodi Rell; University President Michael Hogan; Law School Dean Jeremy Paul; Judge Ralph K. Winter of the U.S. Court of Appeals 2nd Circuit; UConn Law School graduate, former U.S. Attorney and Justice Department official Kevin O’Connor; and Eileen Meskill, Gov. Meskill’s daughter and 1991 UConn Law School graduate.

Meskill, who graduated from the UConn Law School in 1956, was governor of Connecticut from 1971 to 1975, after serving as the sixth district U.S. Congressman from 1967 to 1970. After leaving the governor’s office, he was appointed to be a federal judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit, where he served until his death in 2007.

The Meskill Library has more than half a million titles and volumes. It serves Law School students and faculty; alumni; students from nearby colleges and universities; area practitioners and business people; paralegals; neighbors, including those from the Hartford Seminary community; and the public at large.

“The library and those who toil so brilliantly within it enable the state’s public law school to serve as a focal point for legal understanding and a magnet for the leading lawyers of tomorrow,” says Jeremy Paul, dean of the Law School and Thomas F. Gallivan, Jr. Professor of Real Property Law.

Constructed in 1996, the building recently underwent renovations. From the outside, the 125,000 square-foot, five-level Collegiate Gothic-style structure looks, for the most part, as it did when the building was dedicated in September 1996, with one significant difference: the patio in front of the main entrance has been enlarged and made more inviting. The new wooden café tables have become very popular, especially since wireless service now extends beyond the building.

Inside, extensive renovations have updated the physical space to complement the extensive collections and up-to-date services the library offers.

The main floor has been made more like a reading room, by adding small tables where four people can sit and chat or work on a project together. And similar tables were bought for the balconies overlooking the main floor. In addition, low bookshelves were installed in the middle of the main area of the floor, enabling students to pull out a book and take notes right on the shelf.

Soft seats, as well as new book exhibit displays, have been added to the periodical area — making it a popular spot for neighborhood residents who regularly stop by to read The New York Times or do some “do-it-yourself” legal research. Window seats were added under the tall windows at the south and north ends of the building.

“The library can be intimidating when you first walk in because it is so large,” says Darcy Kirk, associate dean for library and technology and professor of law. “It is now far more welcoming and friendly. It draws you in.”

While changes to the main floor are drawing more people to the library, improvements in other areas of the building have also enhanced the building’s use.

On the top floor, where the library’s subject collections (treatises and monographs) are kept, two group study rooms have been converted to a large, brightly lit classroom that is in high demand among students and faculty.

The fourth floor, which also houses treatises and monographs, is the site of a distance-learning classroom used primarily by the Insurance Law Center. There, too, is one of fourteen popular group study rooms that students can reserve.

The library’s second floor – a level below ground – is abuzz with activity throughout the day, due in large part to the fact that it houses the library’s computer lab, servers, and the Information Services Department Help Desk.

The second floor also is the site of a recently renovated tiered classroom — a classroom from which computers have been removed, now that all research databases can be accessed from computers elsewhere in the library as well as via student laptops.

Frequently cited legal periodicals, the library’s collection of state materials, and 70 open carrels take up the lion’s share of the first floor.

“The library is both a great physical space and a great virtual space,” says Jessica Randall, head of access services.

She credits the improved fourth and fifth floor study rooms, additional open carrels, and new classrooms with drawing more users to the library, and notes that circulation statistics are up well over what they used to be.

Lee Sims, head of reference services, oversees some of the library’s most popular services. Among them is an online “Chat with a Librarian” feature, which is accessible via the library’s website. It is staffed by Sims and four reference librarians on his staff.

“Anyone from anywhere can ask us a question and get a response right away,” says Sims. “Virtual reference is another way to put it.”

He and his staff also do a lot of work compiling bibliographies of relevant materials for faculty. “We have a service that we call Facserv, in which we provide a document delivery service (both print and electronic resources) for the faculty,” he says.

Sims also trains and supervises a student research assistant (RA) pool that handles research requests for faculty members who have a short-term project that their own RA might not be able to get to.

“Facserv and the RA pool are our most popular faculty services,” he says.

Virtual reference tools and electronic databases are, of course, high priorities at the Law Library these days, with hundreds of research databases available in the library and thousands of electronic journals accessible via the Homer Babbidge Library in Storrs.

But that doesn’t mean printed materials are on their way out at the Meskill Library. The librarians emphasize that not everything is online, and students still need to come to the library.

Julie Jones, associate director for library services and adjunct professor of law says, “Many students have a predisposition to things being online, and when you tell them that some things are easier to research in print they simply don’t believe you. In [a course known as] Advanced Legal Research, we have one group do their research using printed materials and another group do it online to see who finds the answer first. It depends on the materials, of course, but at this stage some things are easier to find in print.

“I want the students to recognize that not everything is online, and not everything is in print,” she says. “It’s a very complicated information world at present. It’s our job to teach the students to be fluent in all formats to best serve their clients and the legal profession.”

Although the Meskill Library is one of the largest legal research and technology centers in the world, Kirk and her staff see it as far more than just a place – both physical and virtual – to do legal research.

“Here at UConn,” says Kirk, “we are looking to the library to be the focal point of the Law School – to serve as the de facto student center, as well as a great place to do research or study on one’s own or collaboratively.”