Bookmobile News

Community Foundation Sonoma County and Bread for the Journey Sebastopol are two of our most important partners.  After having the pleasure of working with a number of their officers I can tell you they both exemplify the kind of positive spirit that helps small non-profits like the Free Bookmobile thrive.

A little history: the very first funding the Free Bookmobile received towards purchase of our fabulous vehicle came from Bread for the Journey Sebastopol (BFJ). BFJ board members Sharon Bard and Toni Winter met with bookmobile director Glen Weaver very early in the process and reassured him he was on the right track! Their support has continued to be fundamental to the Free Bookmobile’s success, and in fact Sharon now sits on the Literary Arts Guild board as well.

Last week she boosted our cause yet again, working with Community Foundation Director of Philanthropic Services Miguel Ruelas to co-host an important donor-awareness event.  This lovely afternoon gathering was a big step in getting the word out to folks who support literacy in Sonoma County, and resulted in a crucial matching grant opportunity for the Free Bookmobile as well. Huge thanks to co-hosts Sharon, Miguel, and Julia L. Grant!

5th grade Sonoma Country DaySchool teacher Ben Bacon has been a good friend to the Free Bookmobile.  Last year he hosted a neighborhood book drive for us at his home, and this March he helped his class combine their love for reading with their love for service.  Every book read by his students would later be donated to us, up until May when we could come to the school and collect.  Well it turns out they’ve been a bit more busy than that!

Upon arrival this past Monday, we discovered Ben had rallied the entire school along the way in support of the Free Bookmobile cause. In a little ceremony, they just plain took our breath away by presenting us with a check for almost $2,500 worth of book-buying power! We’ve never been so excited to break open the Scholastic catalog.

This amazing gift comes at a perfect time, when we are running very low on dictionaries, bilingual material, early readers, and young adult books. Our shopping spree will benefit soooo many children across the county…all we can say is “WOW! Thank you, SCDS!”

Filling the Free Bookmobile with great stories they have known...

It’s been a marvelous end of winter and beginning of spring for the Free Bookmobile.  We dodged the rain with dry weather on almost all scheduled event days, and our turn-outs have been growing as word of our excellent service spreads.  Fortunately we’ve been chronicling our journeys so that you can enjoy the sights from the comfort of your computer.  Please take a moment to pop over to our “Photos” page on the website and check out the spring 2012 gallery.  And remember, you can always see the very latest photos and other up-to-the-moment news on our Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/freebookmobile) which you can view even without joining Facebook.  Let us know what you think!

We need your dictionaries! We are completely out of stock at the moment, and dictionaries are, as you might expect, one of our most popular titles. Lots of families in this county don’t have a single dictionary in the home. We can use whatever you can spare, for both children and adults, the more recent, the better. Bilingual dictionaries and other standard reference texts like atlases and thesauruses are also welcome. Please spread the word, and thank you!

Friends of the Sonoma Valley Library President Janet Constantino, a young patient, and Dr. Jerome Smith celebrate the new books on offer at the Sonoma Valley Community Health Center

With the success of the first mini-library at Landpaths Bayer Farm on our minds, we couldn’t help but jump at the chance to do it again when we were contacted by Dave Dobbins of the Friends of the Sonoma Valley Library.  He and his group have been approaching the other non-profits in Sonoma Valley, particularly those that serve the low-income residents of the Springs area, to inquire about installing books and shelves to benefit their patrons.  The response was positive, and with the Friends’ books temporarily inaccessible to them, they asked us to help out.

Of course we were delighted to do so! This past Tuesday we brought boxes and boxes of carefully selected titles to both the Sonoma Valley Community Health Center and the Valley of the Moon Teen Center to fill their empty bookcases (plus a nice big bin for kids’ books at the clinic). Photos of these new Neighborhood Libraries can been seen in the Photo Album section of our Facebook page, and the Sonoma Index-Tribune published an article about our visit to the Health Center:

http://www.sonomanews.com/News-2012/Bookmobile-makes-stop-at-health-center

It’s very satisfying to know that when the Free Bookmobile has to be elsewhere, these folks can keep on finding great reading material.  Now we’re on a roll and are looking forward to the chance to create additional havens of literacy all over the county!

Thanks to two very generous supporters from Geyserville, the Free Bookmobile has recently been able to make patrons an offer they can hardly refuse: for every dollar that goes into our jar, another will automatically be added to help pay our expenses. The great news is that the Fund has just been replenished and the next $500 that is donated on-site will be doubled!

We love this matching grant not only because it helps us raise more money but also because it symbolizes a partnership of support across the county. By expressing confidence in what we do, the grant-makers are offering others a chance to join in the crucial task of helping make it happen. The result is that people who haven’t even met each other are working together to expand the possibilities.

We are grateful for this creative gift, and welcome other ideas as well. Feel free to drop us a line if you get an inspiration!

In case you missed it on our Facebook page, the Free Bookmobile is once again pleased to be a part of the nationwide promotion of literacy that is The Big Read.  Sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts, The Big Read is facilitated locally by the great folks at KRCB community radio & television.  This year we are getting the word out about Mexican-American author Rudolfo Anaya and his best known work, “Bless Me, Ultima”.  Free copies are available at all of our event locations in both English and Spanish. It turns out Rudolfo was a prolific writer and even authored a number of children’s books.  We have been featuring those as well, some in bilingual edition.

The Big Read always inspires a host of creative activities around the featured literature, including a cool contest put on by our friends at the United Way of the Wine Country.  To see more of what’s been going on in Sonoma County, visit the official website and the Facebook page.

300 events!  13,000 people!  45,000 books!  Is it time to celebrate yet?  Oh that’s right, we do that every day while working on the program!

It would have been hard to predict these results when it was just me and my sons hauling books around the county in a trailer in 2009.  But thanks to the tremendous support of this community we quickly expanded that team and have made good on the idea of recirculating books, getting them off the shelf and into the hands of people who need and want them.

We just completed our 300th book give-away event (which was service directly to the kids at a Boys & Girls Club) and are now realizing that 13,000 area residents, most who are access-challenged, have come aboard the Free Bookmobile to choose a total of 45,000 books to take home.  That includes over 6,000 children and 2,200 seniors!

So thank you, all of you, who contribute books and funding and ideas and time and love to the service.  We are becoming better known and that expands our relationships and ability to reach those who can most benefit from what we do.  There will be no slowing down, there’s lots more to do to promote literacy in our county.  And lots of ways to help, so please be in touch if you want to join the fun…

Volunteers welcome!  We have several fun ways you can help the Free Bookmobile, and at the moment we are especially eager to meet folks who might like to become a Neighborhood Promoter.   This is an important job in which you can use your local knowledge to spread the word of our upcoming visits to your area and presto!  More people will get great free books.  Best if you are familiar with local media, schools, e-lists and/or high foot-traffic areas in your town or neighborhood.  Just email Glen@sonic.net for more details, or download our latest volunteer jobs list from our “Help Us!” webpage.

And hey, don’t forget to tell a friend!

We want Sebastopolians to know that the Free Bookmobile is there for them!  In response to the temporary closure of the county’s Sebastopol Library branch, we have added at least four monthly events in town through May.  We will be in the Safeway parking lot from 3 – 7 Pm on February 22, March 28, April 18, and May 16 (all Wednesdays).  Our first event last night went well as we greeted some new patrons who hadn’t yet heard of us and enjoyed happy faces all ’round.  Come ease your library sorrow and pick up some great books for all family members!