“You open it up, and it’s like a treasure chest,” said Ryan Conway, who runs a project called ShareBloomington. That organization helped residents build 10 tiny libraries at its ShareFest event in June 2015.
Little Free Libraries is part of a national movement that began in Wisconsin in 2009. After Todd Bol built one as a tribute to his mother and stuck it in his front yard, his idea took off. These small, wooden libraries now dot street corners and rest in public spaces across the country.
According to the movement’s website, Little Free Libraries aim to promote literacy for adults and children, strengthen communities and set up book exchanges across the world.
The first Bloomington LFL was built by resident Meagan Eller in 2013. Since then, about 35 have gone up throughout the city, Conway said.
Sixteen of these were funded by Duke Energy, which awarded a $5,000 grant to the Monroe County Public Library earlier this year. That allowed Friends of the Library — the library’s nonprofit foundation — to construct LFLs and register them with the national movement.
Mary Jean Regoli, an office manager at Friends of the Library, said the foundation reached out to Bloomington’s neighborhood associations to gauge community interest in the project. Many responded.
Friends of the Library provided the resources — the unfinished wooden boxes — but the neighborhoods were responsible for coming together to decorate, stock and look after the libraries.
“Each of them is really unique and reflects the style of the neighborhood,” Regoli said.
One library sits on the corner of Fairview and Eighth streets, right by Fairview Elementary School. Carol Gulyas, the president of Bloomington’s Near West Side Neighborhood Association, advocated for the library because she said she thought it would help introduce kids to books and create a tighter community.
“It’s a fun little thing full of character that improves the community,” she said. “It’s part of the neighborhood and it’s friendly and approachable.”
Gulyas said she bought about 10 children’s books at the Friends of the Library Bookstore to give to her neighborhood’s LFL. By setting it up near the school, Gulyas said she hopes kids will stop by, peek in and take a book.
Conway and Regoli agreed the libraries have brought neighbors together. Through working together to customize and install them, Conway said the project has gotten people talking to each other. He said the sort of sharing culture that LFLs foster “really increases quality of life.”
“It did so much more than we thought it would do,” Regoli said. “It’s a gathering point in the neighborhood ... it really speaks to people.”
