Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, September 26, 1993 TAG: 9309230211
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-3 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: PULASKI LENGTH: Medium
She was writing for a magazine in New York at the time, she recalled during a recent visit to Pulaski.
Her father was then-President Lyndon B. Johnson, and she had been brought up with the idea that people who were economically fortunate should find some public service to help those less lucky. "So I decided I'd do something that I liked," she said.
She bought books for hospitals and read them to young patients. But she found, on return trips, that the many of the books she donated were missing. She found the hospitals had let children with no books of their own take them home when they were discharged.
Robb had grown up surrounded by books. She recalled her grandmother reading to her often. Family members gave books as gifts. When she would go to the library, she would check out as many books as the library would allow, she said.
She learned that some parents with little income would not let their children check out library books because, if the book got lost, they could not afford to pay for it.
She and others who had made similar discoveries secured a Ford Foundation grant and founded a program they called Reading Is Fundamental. "The idea was to get books into the hands of children," she said. "And now we have over 4,000 programs in the United States."
All this started long before her marriage to Charles Robb, who went on to become governor and is now one of Virginia's U.S. senators, but it is a project she has kept pushing over the years.
In fact, that was what brought her to Pulaski. She met with local RIF coordinator Rachael DeHaven and read to children at the Pulaski County Public Library, which sponsors RIF, and at the Critzer and Northwood elementary schools.
Each RIF program raises its own money. The Pulaski County program started 16 years ago and has put more than 43,000 books into the hands of children in six schools. Extension club homemakers are starting a RIF program in neighboring Floyd County.
DeHaven has been the program's director in Pulaski County for nine years. She said this area seems to be one of the few where RIF is sponsored by a library.
"I wanted to come out here and see how the program actually works," Robb said. She said children need to learn how libraries can be "for fun reading, not just for research things."
She also visited some of the new stores that have opened on Pulaski's Main Street, and bought the book she read to youngsters at the library and schools at Main Street Galleries. "Reuben and the Fire" by Merle Good told of an Amish boy learning valuable lessons as he helped his neighbors save puppies from a fire. It had pictures by Virginia artist P. Buckley Moss, which seemed to pique Robb's interest "because I love illustrations," she said.
One way RIF has gotten more books to more youngsters is to encourage publication of the classics in less-expensive paperback form.
"We went to the book publishers and we said we need to have more children's books in paperback," Robb said. "When I grew up, paperbacks were the books you bought at the bus station and hid from your mother!"
That has changed now. There is virtually no type of book that has not been published in paperback, and paperbacks are handy for carrying on trips, reading at lunch or whenever someone has a few idle minutes.
In areas like Pulaski County where some youngsters do not complete high school, she said, it is particularly important to encourage reading. One of the best ways parents can do so is by setting an example of reading themselves and by reading with their children, she said.
"To encourage children to read - there's no greater gift that you can give anybody," she said. "You might never leave Pulaski, but you can learn about the rest of the world."
Robb said test scores and library use generally goes up in areas where RIF programs are started. "Although RIF doesn't teach reading and we don't test people," she said, "it just kind of gives you that jump-start."
Once children find books they particularly like, she said, they will look for other books by the same author or similar kinds of stories.
She recalled one little girl at a RIF program who declared she did not like to read, until she happened onto the E.B. White classic, "Charlotte's Web." The girl said she had no idea they made that movie into a book.
When she learned that the book came first, she went on to read every E.B. White story she could find, Robb said.
by CNB