Dolly Parton’s legacy lives on through book deliveries to kids

By Jayla Whitfield-Anderson and Kaitlin Bender-Thomas

CLEVELAND, Georgia, Aug 27 (Reuters) – For 3-year-old Simon Dockery, a trip to the mailbox can mean a new adventure.

Since he was a baby, books from Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library have arrived at his family’s Georgia home each month. Now his younger brother, 11-month-old Samuel, also receives books of his own.

The deliveries have helped turn reading into a family tradition, their mother Olivia Dockery said.

“It’s so exciting and for our family it was like a launch point for just the love of books,” Dockery, 30, said in an interview. “Each month, the oldest looks forward to going to the mailbox and getting that book out.”

Parton, the country music star and philanthropist who died on Tuesday at age 80, founded the Imagination Library in 1995, inspired in part by her father’s inability to read or write. The program sends free books each month to enrolled children from birth until age five.

What began by serving children in Parton’s home county in Tennessee grew into an international literacy initiative operating across five countries. The program has distributed more than 300 million free books worldwide.

Dockery said she did not have an enthusiasm for reading as a child and hopes the monthly deliveries will help give her sons something different.

“I didn’t grow up with a love for books,” she said. “Something that we want to instill is just a love for literature. And having these books provided for us each month just kind of continues that fire.”

The books are selected based on a child’s age, personalized with the child’s name and mailed directly to his or her home, helping make receiving a new book an event of its own.

In the U.S. capital city of Washington, more than 100,000 children have participated in the program through a joint effort with the Imagination Library and the D.C. Public Library, according to D.C. Public Library Executive Director Richard Reyes-Gavilan.

Shami Chimonyo enrolled her 7-month-old daughter shortly after she was born. Concerns about declining literacy rates motivated her to sign up, Chimonyo said.

“I love that the books are extremely well-written and have great grammar, as well as just they’re a great visual for young learners,” Chimonyo said. “It’s just a treat that we’re looking forward to continue having and receiving.”

(Reporting by Jayla Whitfield-Anderson in Cleveland, Georgia and Kaitlin Bender-Thomas in Washington;Writing by Lisa Richwine; Editing by Stephen Coates)