Beloved singer-songwriter, actor and businesswoman Dolly Parton died Aug. 25, but her Imagination Library lives on with the Postal Service helping to deliver her books.
Imagination Library mails free age-appropriate books each month to registered children from birth until age 5. Parton started the childhood literacy program in 1995 to honor her father, a sharecropper who couldn’t read or write. It is headquartered in her hometown of Sevierville, TN.
Samuel Wolfe, vice president of operations at the Dollywood Foundation, oversees Imagination Library’s U.S. and global mailing partnerships.
“What started as a very small program from the heart and a way to give back to her community of Sevier County has grown into the world’s largest book-gifting organization 31 years later. We operate in five countries around the world, mailing 3.6 million books per month across all those countries — with 95 percent of that 3.6 million right here in the United States,” Wolfe said.
Imagination Library mails books to children in 60 percent of U.S. ZIP Codes, he said.
“Children receive books throughout the country, the Virgin Islands and remote areas in Alaska, so having a reliable and affordable mail service makes what we do possible. Last year, we mailed about 40 million books through USPS,” Wolfe said.
In 2018, the program celebrated its 100 millionth gifted book with a ceremony at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, where Parton donated her “Coat of Many Colors” book to the collection. The program recently celebrated passing 300 million gifted books.
“As we’re processing our next mailing list for the month, it looks like it’s going to be a record of new enrollments into the program. There’ll be even more books going out because of her legacy and the love people have for her who are enrolling in the program,” Wolfe said.
Postal Service employees at the Knoxville, TN, Business Mail Entry Unit find meaning in the program.
Trey Dunn, the Knoxville BMEU’s bulk mail supervisor, said he handles 60-100 pallets of Imagination Library’s books a day.
“It’s just good to be a part of something that forwards the education of the children,” Dunn said.
“Imagination Library is a major mailer for the Post Offices. A lot of people here grew up on Dolly and benefited from the Imagination Library and her philanthropy,” said Postmaster Michael Loomis, who oversees mail delivery to the organization’s headquarters as well as the Dollywood theme park in nearby Pigeon Forge.
Children enrolled in the Imagination Library also receive a letter from Parton that comes with their welcome and graduation books.
“We hear stories from families about the anticipation of the books arriving in the mail. Mail carriers are delivering those, and I think they love the excitement of delivering the books just as much as the families do receiving them,” Wolfe said.
Email us your feedback. Your comments could be included in our “Mail” column.
