Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, March 5, 1990 TAG: 9003052038
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Paul Dellinger
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The Lonesome Pine Regional Library, which serves those counties, established a free paperbacks-by-mail service about 10 years ago.
"We circulate between 4,000 and 5,000 books a month," said Hazel Jessee, who works in the basement of the Wise County Public Library with Jennifer Hall in the so-called "mailbox library."
The chamber is practically wall-to-wall paperbacks, nearly 45,000 in all. Twice a year, Jessee and Hall and a number of volunteers assemble pages printed at the Norton Press into 25,000 catalogs, which are mailed to rural route and homebound residents of the region.
The catalogs contain more than 20 pages of brief summaries of general fiction, Gothic, mystery, science fiction, Western, adult and light romances, adventure, occult, historical and children's books. There is also lots of non-fiction, including cookbooks, gardening, crafts, psychology and religion.
Each catalog contains a postcard, with postage included, for recipients to list the books they want along with their addresses. The paperbacks are sent in special envelopes, complete with return mailing labels, postage, a new order card and even tape to seal them, that can be reused for returning the books. The loan period is three weeks, but if users desire to keep a book longer, they can write to the library about it.
The biggest numbers of users are in Lee and Scott counties, Jessee said. During the 1988-89 fiscal year, the mailbox library circulated 14,965 books to Lee County residents, 14,139 in Scott County, 9,809 in Wise County and 9,183 in Scott County.
One 91-year-old Lee County woman who used the mailbox library made a special trip to Wise, Jessee recalled. "She wanted to meet me."
That is the kind of thing, she said, that makes all the cataloging, packaging, mailing and other work worthwhile. - Paul Dellinger
by CNB