European Regional Library

The European Regional Library is now closed to the public. Please visit the Heidelberg Library to check out new materials, use public computers, and many other in-library services we offer. Thank you!

Library Orientation and Introduction to Research Skills

For continuing education students and units interested in using the library for their job. Please call the librarians to schedule.

Study rooms: 1

Reading reference room: 12 person capacity

The European Regional Library offers a military history collection of approximately 2,000 items for in library use.

Handicap accessible (ramp)

After hours book drop

Tours

Reference help

Equipment

Research computers: 6

Microsoft Office Suite

Recreational computers: 12

Photocopiers: $.05 black and white

Microfilm readers: e-mail and $.05 printing

Typewriters

Headphones

Printing: $.05 black and white

The Army Europe Libraries program began with the Fifth Army’s Invasion Training Center at Port-Aux Poules, Algeria, during World War II. The unit dayroom had about 200 assorted fiction books supplemented by small sets of pocket books issued by the U.S. Army Special Services. This “library” became an item of top priority and moved with the unit to Salerno, Italy in April 1944. The soldiers made it a custom to donate the books they received from home, and when the unit deactivated in July 1944, the collection numbered 400 books.

The collection later moved into a casino in Vittel, France where Special Services acquired a collection of 4,000 English language titles. In March 1945, troops crossed the Rhein River into Germany and the Sixth Army Group Headquarters set up its headquarters in Heidelberg which remained unscarred from allied bombing. The collection was moved to Heidelberg and housed in a new building at Heidelberg University. Shortly thereafter, the war in Europe drew to a close, and the collection was turned over to the Special Services Officer of U.S. Army’s Seventh Army Headquarters, which replaced Sixth Army Group Headquarters. Some of the original collection, including the pocket books, remains at what is now the European Regional Library Support Center in Heidelberg.