Library history
Thomas Shanks McPherson & William C. Mearns
Written by Lara Wilson, university archivist and Wendie McHenry, assistant university librarian
The public campaign to raise funds to establish UVic engaged Victorians from all backgrounds and walks of life. Fittingly enough, the central library at UVic bears the names of two of the strongest early sparks that set fire to that movement. Victoria entrepreneur Thomas Shanks McPherson believed that the “single most important factor in the progress of a city” was the growth of a university. And though McPherson passed away a year before construction of the library began, his bequest funded the development of UVic’s present library.
One of McPherson’s colleagues in advocating for a university, the business leader William C. Mearns, was well known in the 1960s for his efforts to acquire the lands that make up the Gordon Head campus. With his substantial help, an unprecedented $5-million fundraising campaign was waged to establish the campus — making UVic the only university in Canada to have purchased its own land.
Spurred by a new donation from the Mearns family, The William C. Mearns Centre for Learning opened in 2008, signaling a multigenerational commitment to philanthropy. The new media commons and enhanced archives and special collections in the Mearns Centre put the treasures of the past alongside technology that looks to the future, linking students and researchers with scholarship around the world. The expansion has renewed the library’s place at the heart of the campus, with a matched set of visionary benefactors named at the library entrance.