Another Little Free Library

About one hundred yards from the Daniel Boone Regional Library, here in Columbia, I found another little library.  This one is actually registered with Little Free Library at www.littlefreelibray.org.

As  you can see it even has a registration, or charter, number on the lower right side.

I am a huge believer in books.  Not the ebook, or digital version, which I think provide an inferior experience, but rather the old fashioned kind that you can hold in your hand.

I plan on building one over this winter to launch this coming spring but I am going to specialize in children’s books. There are only  two chartered ones, this one and another one I  do not have a picture of yet.  The one I wrote about two days ago does not have a charter,  and there are bound to be others.  Columbia is a college town, and is generally a book loving community.  KOMU TV ran a story about several I have not seen  yet, some without charters,  in July of this  year.

Here is what the Little Free Library web site has to say about how the project got started:

 n the beginning—2009--Todd Bol of Hudson, Wisconsin, built a model of a one room schoolhouse as a tribute to his mother, a former school teacher who loved reading. He filled it with books and put it on a post in his front yard. His neighbors and friends loved it. He built several more and gave them away. Each one had a sign that said FREE BOOKS. Rick Brooks, of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, saw Bol's do-it-yourself project while they were discussing potential social enterprises. Together, the two saw opportunities to achieve a wide variety of goals for the common good.

In September 2015, the organization reported over 32,000 chartered Little Free Library sites in all 50 U.S. states,  and in over 70 other countries world wide.

Fall Sale at Tryathletics - A Columbia Tradition

Columbia is blessed with some great locally owned and operated business such as Tryathletics.  If your local chances are you already know about their annual shoe sale which is always held around this time of year.  The sale started this morning and I stopped by there on my way to work, and purchased two pair of high quality running shoes for half price.  Not the shoes you get at the discount or big box stores, but the ones that you find at the serious sporting good and sport specialty stores.

When I got there the place was packed.  The parking lot was full, and there was even a food truck outside doing a very brisk business.  I should have taken a picture of that! The picture to the left is only a fraction of the huge selection they had to offer.

 I am a huge supporter of shopping locally at locally owned and operated enterprises.  I am proud put in a good word for them.

1605 Chapel Hill Rd. 
Columbia, MO 65203
(573)-447-2453 (phone)
                                                            (573)-447-4477 (fax)

Little Free Libraries Come to Columbia Missouri

Some  ideas are so fresh, so elegant, and make so much sense that I just fall in love with them.  Then there are some extra special ones that go even further.  They spread a sense of brotherly love, cooperation, and goodwill.

Netflix is an example of the first.  I have long been a fan of Netflix starting way back when they were in the business of just shipping you a DVD through the mail.  I was glad to finally escape the awful store front débâcle that was the retail DVD movie rental business.   An example of the second kind is the little free library movement.

Yesterday I was out walking when I passed a gentleman who I often see out walking with his dog.  We exchanged greetings and I noticed he was carrying books.  I was curious as to what kind of books somebody would be carrying while they walked and asked him.  He told me, and then explained he was going to the "little library" which was less than a hundred yards up the road on Green Meadows Court,  just across the street from the Green Meadows Court and Greenbriar Drive intersection.













According to the little free library map there are six other locations ran by local volunteer participants who have registered.  There may be others that are not listed. The fabulous web site that started it all is located online at http://littlefreelibrary.org/.  The movement has spread throughout the United States and even overseas.  You can listen to a short news report about it, less three minutes,  thanks to Vermont public radio.

My own neighbourhood library is about a quarter of a mile away from my front door.   Today I dropped off two books and picked up one.