It was named for Fitz Hugh Ludlow, author of the first full-length work of drug literature written by an American, The Hasheesh Eater (1857).

After the death of its owner, Julio Mario Santo Domingo, Jr., his family loaned the book collection to the Houghton Library at Harvard University and the music collection to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland, Ohio.

The Ludlow Library flourished during a period of perhaps the most intense media interest ever focused on the personal, social, scientific and political aspects of drug experience.

The Library helped hundreds of writers, filmmakers, and news media researchers collect accurate historical information on cannabis, the opiates, coca and cocaine, and psychedelics for their publications.

The Library's advisory Board of Trustees included a number of eminent researchers and writers, including Chauncey Leake, Richard Evans Schultes, Albert Hofmann, Alexander Shulgin, Andrew Weil, Oscar Janiger, Ralph Metzner, Laura Huxley, Allen Ginsberg, Weston LaBarre, R. Gordon Wasson, Tod H. Mikuriya, and Lawrence Ferlinghetti.