The Leddy Library was built in two stages: the first, now known as the West Building, was designed by Windsor architects Pennington & Carter and officially opened in 1958. The larger, main building was designed by the firm Bland, Lemoyne, Shine, Lacroix Architects and opened in 1971. The two wings are connected by a two-storey walkway.

The complex was named to honour then-UWindsor president J. Francis Leddy in 1977.

Dr. Leddy was a scholar of classics and donated hundreds of volumes to the library during and after his tenure as president, which ran 1964 to 1978 – the longest in the institution’s history.

Leddy was born in Ottawa in 1911, but grew up in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Saskatchewan, and did graduate work in Latin and Greek at the University of Chicago. He was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, where he received a D.Phil. in ancient history.

He taught classics at the University of Saskatchewan from 1936 to 1961, serving as dean of its College of Arts and Science from 1949 to 1964 and vice-president academic from 1961 to 1964. When he took up his appointment in Windsor, he was the first Roman Catholic layman to serve as president of a Canadian university.

A charter member of the Humanities Research Council, the Humanities Association of Canada, Classical Association of Canada, and the Canada Council for the Arts, Leddy demonstrated an interest in world affairs as president of the Canadian Service for Overseas Students, chair and later honorary president of the Canadian University Service Overseas, and president of the World Federalists of Canada and chair of the World Association of World Federalists.

He died in 1998 in Windsor and is buried in Saskatoon.