English: Looking southeast at the main (north) entrance of Renne Library on the campus of Montana State University in Bozeman, Montana.

Renne Library was completed in late 1949. It was designed by omnipresent Bozeman architect Fred Willson, with assistance from E.W. Bunnell. The 8,900 square-foot Collegiate Gothic building was not one of Willson's best works, and the structure was considered plain and boring. The Library Building opened with 100,000 volumes on January 9, 1950.

A 125,000 square-foot addition was begun on the west side of the building in 1960. Work on the expansion was slow: The first floor did not open until 1962, and the upper floors not until late 1966.

In October 1978, the Library Building was named for Roland Renne, the university's sixth president.

A $8.5 million renovation began in 2000 and concluded in 2003. Friends of the MSU library raised $300,000 of this total. The renovation added seismic bracing to bring the building up to earthquake codes, added dormers the upper floor of the original building, and replaced doors and windows througout the structure with energy-efficient ones. LIfe-threatening safety, handicapped accessibility, security, HVAC and lighting issues were also addressed. The renovation increased space by 20 percent, added the Brewed Awakening coffee bar and created the sunny, open Clowder Flats study area. The look of the library was updated as well to a more modern style, and a ceramic sculpture by Rudy Audio added to the lobby.

A $600,000 renovation in 2011 was paid for by a private donor and several years' worth of budget savings. A private donor also gave $550,000 to form an endowment to keep the library up-to-date. The renovation transformed the building's first floor, moving the Reference Desk to a more prominent location, creating more space for each computer terminal, adding handicapped-accessible computer terminals, adding a wildlife documentary video collection station, and moving the Writing Center from the second floor to the first floor and enlarging it. (The Writing Center change was funded by a donation from the Associated Students of MSU.) A large space on the first floor was cleared to create a "Library Commons" -- where tables of varying geometric shape can be easily wheeled around and locked together to create a dynamic group study space for students. The library also purchased "iRovers" (a large white board with attached projector) for use in the area.

The 158,999 square-foot Renne Library saw 800,000 visits in 2011, making it the second most-used building on campus after the Strand Union Building. It has a large classroom equipped with numerous computer stations in the basement. The second floor houses the Special Collections -- which includes the papers of Senator Burton K. Wheeler and the Yellowstone National Park Collection.