原名羅氏圖書館，1916年落成后為圖書館，又稱紀念堂。現稱紅樓圖書館。

紅樓圖書館的前身是羅氏圖書館。1915年歲首，奠定隅石，次年初夏落成。“紅樓”可謂“樓如其名”，從外墻、窗格、正門到屋內的木梯都是紅色，這也延續了圣約翰建筑群的整體風格。立面形式仍然采用清水磚墻、硬山屋頂，不同的是圓拱券窗不見了，全部為狹長的平窗。正立面二樓為一排布置緊湊的狹長平窗。中西參半兩層建筑，鋼筋水泥及磚木結構，入口朝東，突出軸線，講求對稱，總體感覺莊重肅穆。

The Red Building Library was formerly the Low Library. At the beginning of the year 1915, the university laid the cornerstone of the library, which was completed in the early summer of the following year. The red building , as its name suggests, has its exterior wall, window panes, front door to wooden staircase inside all painted in red, which carries on the overall style of the St. John’s building complex. The facades are still dry walls of bricks and Chinese gabled roofs, with the exception that the round-arch windows are replaced by long and narrow casement windows. On the first floor of the front facade is a row of long and narrow casement windows in compact arrangement. It is a two-storey building with a mixture of half Chinese and half Western architectural elements, and reinforced concrete and brick-and-timber structures. With an east-facing entrance, it maintains symmetry of the structures along a prominent axis. Overall, it conveys a feeling of solemnity and dignity.

圖書館藏書極為豐富，曾任美國紐約市市長、哥倫比亞大學校長的羅氏也與其弟向圣約翰捐贈多種書籍，故圣約翰圖書館被命名為羅氏圖書館。1932年統計，圖書館藏書量達43000余冊，中西文各半。1949年時藏書量更是達到12萬余冊。

The collection of books in the library was extremely abundant. St. John’s Library was named “the Low Library” in gratitude for Seth Low (who had been mayor of the New York City and president of Columbia University in the United States) and his brother, both of whom generously donated a variety of books to the library. In 1932, the library collection reached over 43,000 books, half in Chinese and half in foreign languages. By 1949, the collection reached more than 120,000 copies.

1952年，華東政法學院成立并接收這座圖書館。1958年，華東政法學院與上海財經學院、上海復旦大學法律系、中國科學院上海經濟研究所和上海歷史研究所合并，成立了上海社會科學院，該館便成了上海社會科學院圖書館。1963年和1979年華政兩度復校后，該館仍為上海社會科學院所有，直到1999年上海社會科學院將圖書運走后移交空館舍。

In 1952, East China Institute of Politics and Law was established and took over the library. In 1958, it became the library of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences when it was established by merging East China Institute of Politics and Law with Shanghai Institute of Finance and Economics, the Law Department of Fudan University, Shanghai Institute of Economics and Shanghai Institute of History of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The library remained under the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences after the two reopenings of ECUPL, in 1963 and 1979 respectively, until 1999 when the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences removed the books and transferred the vacant building to ECUPL.