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Dearest Gentle Readers:
We hope this finds you all well and having a peaceful and joyous holiday season! We are writing to share with you a bit of news about the future of the Free Books Project.
While we deeply appreciate having had the opportunity to create a library at the Free Books Place on Cooper Street, it has become clear to us that we can have a greater impact and better serve our communities by meeting folks where they are. To that end, we are transitioning from a singular Free Books Place to installing Free Book Shelves in multiple locations. Our mission is to break down financial barriers to literacy access by providing books to as many people as possible, and Free Book Shelves will allow our books to find their way to more folks who need them, increasing literacy access and expanding the reach of our efforts.
When the first Free Book Shelves were installed at Roz Pichardo’s Sunshine House in Kensington to support Operation Save our City, we saw books fly off of those shelves and into the hands of those who needed them. There are so many wonderful community organizations with locations throughout Camden and Philadelphia whose guests could benefit from free books, and we are excited to partner with them to increase literacy access in the communities we all serve.
The Free Books Place will operate until the end of December, when we will shift our efforts to the installation of Free Book Shelves in multiple locations in the new year. We are so grateful to all our community partners who have helped support us in our mission over the last six (!) years, and we are excited to continue to work together with individuals and organizations who share our vision of increased opportunity and resources for our communities.
Thank you so much to you all for supporting us through all our iterations, and a special thank you to Shantice (pictured below), for volunteering to help us set up the Free Books Place and re-stock our Book Arks every Saturday since day one! We are so grateful for all of the wonderful folks we've met on our journey, and especially for the support of caring volunteers like Shantice.
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