In the early 1980s, members of the Fenway Library Consortium (FLC) investigated the feasibility of jointly operating an automated library system. During those years, the high costs of automation prohibited most small libraries from undertaking such a project independently. Having participated in resource sharing since the FLC’s inception in 1975, the Fenway libraries believed that sharing online access to their collections would be a logical next step.

In January 1987, seven of the thirteen FLC libraries agreed to incorporate under the name of Fenway Libraries Online (FLO) for the purpose of developing and sharing an integrated library system. With the generous assistance of federal grants awarded by the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners, the FLO libraries constructed and equipped a central computer facility at Wentworth Institute of Technology and combined their bibliographic records into one database representing over 500,000 volumes. By September 1989, the Fenway Libraries Online system was fully operational for all of the member libraries. The following year, FLO implemented a document delivery system that resulted in a dramatic increase in interlibrary loan throughout the network, and in 1994, offered members their first Internet connection.

The creation of Fenway Libraries Online was made possible through the cooperation and hard work of many consultants, institutional administrators, library directors, library staff and the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners. The Wentworth Institute of Technology provided vital institutional support and continues to host FLO’s headquarters to this day. In 2017, The Board of Directors voted to change the name to the Fenway Library Organization to better represent their growing community.

In 2020, FLO member Simmons University became the first library in North America to implement FOLIO, an open source library services platform. Since then, FLO has moved its other full member libraries to FOLIO and implemented the ReShare ILL system for resource sharing and its union catalog.