Local Lending (Illinois Residents Only)

The Illinois Firefighter Line of Duty Deaths Digital Image Collection Database provides online access to digitized photographs and records, historical summaries, and oral history interviews that document the ultimate sacrifice of more than 800 Illinois firefighters over the past 150 years.  Digital access to this history memorializes the firefighters, increases awareness of their sacrifice, and supplies contemporary firefighters with valuable lessons learned from the various deaths.

Access to magazines and journals is available to Illinois firefighters, fire departments, and other patrons at no charge.  Photocopied articles from periodicals can be delivered to patrons via password-protected Internet access or interlibrary loan.

The library’s fire and emergency periodicals include

• Fire Engineering
• Fire Chief
• Firehouse
• EMS Magazine
• Fire & Arson Investigator
• Fire Apparatus & Emergency Equipment
• Fire Findings
• Fire Magazine
• FireRescue
• Industrial Fire World
• International Journal of Emergency Mental Health
• NFPA Journal and
  
• WNYF: With New York Firefighters

Other current periodicals available at the library include

• Counterterrorism
• Evidence Technology Magazine
• Homeland Security Today
• Occupational Health and Safety Magazine
• Sprinkler Age and 
• Training

The resources listed in this guide are useful for those looking for information regarding farm fires, farm equipment hazards, large animal rescue on the farm, and silo/grain bin emergencies. The guide is specifically targeted for those in the fire service and first responders, but can also be useful for farm owners/workers or researchers of these topics.

Browse topic-specific tabs for books in our catalog, free web resources, and other information relevant to Agricultural Emergencies.

Use this IFSI Home tab to find more information about the IFSI library and requesting materials.

The Illinois Fire Service Institute Library contains books, codes and standards, DVDs, CDs, periodicals, manuals, e-resources, audiobooks, and other fire emergency resources, totaling over 65,000 items. We serve all first responders in the state of Illinois. Materials can be requested in person, by phone or email, or online through our catalog. You can search our catalog by title, author, keyword, subject, or publisher, and choose the formats you want to see. Enter as few or as many search terms as you would like; the more search terms you use the fewer results you'll get, but the results will be more specific. If you live in Illinois and have a public library card, we can send materials to your public library via interlibrary loan. Anyone is also welcome to visit us in person!

Using popular subject headings is an efficient way of finding exploring IFSI resources and finding what you need. Using the library's Virtual Bookshelf, users can search Agricultural Emergency headings (below) and view related physical and digital items in our catalog.

• Farm Accidents
• Farm Fires
• Agricultural Safety
• Agricultural Rescue

Heading results will include an item's title and author as well as any applicable copyright and URL information. Clicking on a record title will provide more information about a particular item, including further subject description, format, and availability.

Illinois Fire Service Institute Library

 Accessing IFSI Library Materials

The IFSI Library houses more than 65,000 items, including books, periodicals, manuals, codes and standards, DVDs, CDs, e-resources, audiobooks and other fire emergency resources. Users can request materials in-person, via telephone or email, or through the Online Public Access Catalog at the library website.

 Searching the Library’s Collection

Browse by popular subject using the Virtual Bookshelf, which is linked from the IFSI Library’s homepage.

• Click on a hyperlinked subject term to retrieve a list of IFSI Library materials on that subject.
• From the list of results, click on the title of an item to retrieve a Record Details window containing additional information about that item, such as subject, format, publication year, and availability for interlibrary loan.
• Click on the book icon next to an item to add that item to your Request Bin, which is accessible in the upper left hand corner of the webpage.
• Click on the Checkout button in the Request Bin to request that item.

Search for a specific item, author, subject or format using the IFSI Library’s Online Public Access Catalog.

• Search for materials by title, subject or author. You may limit your search to one or more formats (i.e. Book, Article, DVD, etc.).
• Search for a specific SUBJECT by accessing the FireTalk thesaurus to find recommended search terms. Copy the recommended term(s) you find in FireTalk into the Subjects field.
• Search the ANY KEYWORD field when you have incomplete title or author information or when you do not know the recommended subject search terms.  The Any Keyword field searches for words anywhere in the catalog record.
• To narrow your search parameters, combine search terms from among multiple fields. For example, a Subjects search for “rapid intervention teams” can be narrowed by typing “training” into the Any Keyword field.

Library Hours:

8:00 am - 5:00 pm

Monday - Friday

Special operating hours may be held during events.

IFSI Library Website

IFSI Library Staff:

Lian Ruan, Head Librarian: lruan@illinois.edu

Diane Richardson, Reference & User Training Librarian: dlrichar@illinois.edu

David Ehrenhart, Archivist and Metadata Librarian: ehrenha1@illinois.edu

Contact fsi-library@illinois.edu with any comments, questions, or concerns.