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About OCLC : Heritage

History of OCLC

In the beginning…

In 1967, the presidents of the colleges and universities in the state of Ohio founded the Ohio College Library Center (OCLC) to develop a computerized system in which the libraries of Ohio academic institutions could share resources and reduce costs.

OCLC’s first offices were in the Main Library on the campus of The Ohio State University (OSU), and its first computer room was housed in the OSU Research Center. It was from these academic roots that Frederick G. Kilgour, OCLC’s first president, oversaw the growth of OCLC from a regional computer system for 54 Ohio colleges into an international network.

Expanding beyond Ohio

In 1977, the Ohio members of OCLC adopted changes in the governance structure that enabled libraries outside Ohio to become members and participate in the election of the Board of Trustees; the Ohio College Library Center became OCLC, Inc. In 1981, the legal name of the corporation became OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc. Today, OCLC serves more than 72,000 libraries of all types in the U.S. and 170 countries and territories around the world.

OCLC Canada

In 1979, the first Canadian and the first international library joined OCLC. From 1979 to 1990, OCLC served Canadian libraries the main office in Dublin, Ohio. In 1990, OCLC signed an agreement with a local distributor to promote the cooperative and its cataloging and ILL services. In 1997, OCLC created its Canadian division. Today, OCLC Canada has five employees in its Chambly office and two employees working from home offices (Ontario and Western Canada). In October 2000, OCLC Canada acquired LTS to provide local contract cataloging to Canadian libraries. The LTS division has 23 employees located in Winnipeg, Manitoba.