The nation is mourning Dolly Parton. Parton died August 25 at the age of 80. Her legend will live on in the country music she performed and in the over 3,000 – she claimed it might be closer to 5000 – songs she wrote. She had no children of her own, but every night for 31 years, millions of children across the world have listened to a bedtime story from Dolly.
In 1995, Parton created the Imagination Library through the Dollywood Foundation. The program sends free books to children from birth until their fifth birthday – 60 books in all. It began as a tribute to her father, who couldn’t read.
“He was one of the wisest men I’ve ever known, but I knew in my heart his inability to read probably kept him from seeing all his dreams come true,” Parton said in a video on the Imagination Library website.”Inspiring kids to read became my passion.”
Imagination Library has now celebrated milestones that include sending over 330 million books to budding readers in the U.S. Australia, Ireland, Canada, and the United Kingdom. Currently, one in six children in the U.S. is part of the program, and 3,000,000 children receive a book each month. Imagination Library also now offers books in braille.
The program is powered by the Dollywood Foundation engine, but local input makes sure the train arrives at the station. The first book sent to each child who starts the program is always the classic The Little Engine That Could.
In the process, the Dollywood Foundation covers the overhead costs and negotiates pricing for the books. A local partner or partners – in Grant County, this is Combined Appeal and Kiwanis, who have teamed up with the Grant County Library. Combined Appeal and Kiwanis fundraise to cover the wholesale price of a book and the cost of mailing it from the foundation. The library helps to register the family and maintain the mailing list of participants.
Grant County is one of the few counties in our area that participates. Roberts, Big Stone, and Lac qui Parle counties do not, mainly because they have not been able to secure generous partners such as Kiwanis and Combined Appeal donors.
The Grant County program was spearheaded by Kay O’Farrell in August 2005. It has continued to grow and now provides for 320 books to be sent to children in our community every month.
If you would like to help support the Imagination Library in Grant County, contact the Milbank Kiwanis. At Grant County Combined Appeal, contact Jolene. (Now where have we heard that name?)
To enroll your child in the Imagination Library program, stop by the Grant County Library at 207 E. Park Avenue in Milbank.
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