Cobb EMC

Painted with a colorful and whimsical design, this little free library outside Ball Ground elementary School makes it fun for students to "Take a Book. leave a Book."

Many of the library designs take inspiration from popular books and characters, making them eye-catching and amusing.

Little Libraries, IMPACTBig By Shannon Sickmon, Woodstock Resident

To boost both kindness and literacy, Todd H. Bol founded the Little Free Library, a nonprofit organization. About a dozen years ago Bol built a birdhouse-like structure with a clear glass window and installed it in front of his home with the simple direction, “Take a book. Leave a book.” Today similar small structures can be placed anywhere—in front yards, in front of churches or businesses, in parks, and in the case of the City of Los Angeles, in police stations. The idea is that no matter a person’s circumstances, everyone can have access to great books.

Todd, who passed away from pancreatic cancer in 2018, said about his pet project, “I really believe in a Little Free Library on every block and a book in every hand. I believe people can fix their neighborhoods, fix their communities, develop systems of sharing, learn from each other, and see that they have a better place on this planet to live.”

Since its inception in 2009 the modest little project has become a worldwide movement, with some 100,000 Little Free Libraries (LFLs) in all fifty states and in more than 108 countries throughout the world. Some of the boxes are simple, but other people have created LFLs that are a testament to imagination. Some LFLs look like miniature churches. One is an exact replica of a Volkswagen bus, another is shaped like a canoe, and yet another resembles Oscar the Grouch, complete with trash can. If creativity isn’t your strong suit, the organization has kits you can purchase to build your own LFL with only a few basic tools. Thousands of stories have come from people who took the time to build a LFL, but one of the most heartwarming is from an older gentleman in Sherman Oaks, California. He placed the library in his front yard and noticed an immediate response. “[The library] turned strangers into friends and a sometimes-impersonal neighborhood into a community. I met more neighbors in the first three weeks than in the previous thirty years.”

In Cherokee County Cristin Bell, Justine Beckebrede, and Beth Cronan, three teachers from Hasty Elementary, spearheaded a project to get two LFLs in Canton city parks. They contacted Canton City Councilman Shawn Tolan, who loved the idea, but thought they could do even more. He put a post on the Cherokee Connect Facebook page. The response was instantaneous and overwhelming. Within six hours of the post going live, the city had enough sponsors to put LFLs in all eight city parks.

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n the middle of 2019, Pie Bar in Downtown Woodstock unveiled its newest addition, the Little Free Pie-brary .

Decorated to match the storefront and built by cofounder

Cody Bolden, the pie-brary has served as a fun conversation piece and functional library for many residents of Woodstock . Lauren Bolden, cofounder, shares that the idea started during small conversations about books .

“We had a guest who would walk to our store from her home just behind Main Street and chat with our team members about the books she was reading, the books they enjoyed, and all things reading. Our wheels started turning as more of our team talked about how much we all loved to read, how we’ve worked with the library system, and how we could bring that concept to Pie Bar,” lauren shares.

One of Pie Bar’s values is community, and its goal was to share the Pie Bar values outside of the business’s four walls . Lauren’s husband and co-owner Cody took on the task of constructing their pie-brary from scratch and outfitted it to mimic the store’s white shiplap exterior . The team members then took to painting it . The pie-brary receives new book donations almost daily, including many books from local authors . The Pie Bar team curates the library with rotating themes, such as children’s books, young adult novels, and nonfiction . This way there’s always a new variety of books to stick your nose into .

Lauren shares that some customers have used the pie-brary to Pay it Forward by placing Pie Bar gift cards into the middle of some books . The Pie Bar team hopes its little free library brightens someone’s day and engages the community with its local business . Besides, what goes better with pie than a good book?

dr. Susan and Becky Buice donated a library to Harmon Field in Canton and collected hundreds of books to be placed in the library as well.

uuu Shawn says that while volunteers built most of the libraries from kits the website provided, some volunteers made others from scratch. “The Little Free Library Project was a labor of love. It clearly demonstrated how people will gladly raise their hand whenever there is a worthy cause. Most of the sponsors pulled money out of their own pockets to fund the libraries, and the City of Canton staff bent over backwards to help bring it to life. Kudos to everyone!” Thanks to the volunteers’ efforts, residents and visitors alike now can take a book or leave books in any of the eight Canton city parks. In addition, Cherokee County School District, with funding from the Credit Union of Georgia, sponsored a project to build more Free Little Libraries at a number of elementary schools throughout the county. The best part about this project is that the libraries were built by Cherokee County high school students in the construction career pathway program. Scott O’Bryant, the construction careers teacher at Cherokee County High School, was responsible for building eleven of the twenty-two libraries.