With the current threats to libraries, bookstores, and the freedom to read, I thought it would be a good time to remember when people craved books and knowledge. As part of the Works Progress Administration, which was established to help pull the U.S. out of the Great Depression in the early part of the last century, the Pack Horse Library Project was developed to deliver books to remote regions of the Appalachian Mountains in rural Kentucky.
While it may seem like an easy job – loading books onto packhorses and mules and riding into the hills to deliver books – it was actually a dangerous and time-consuming task. The riders, called “book women”, traveled over vast swaths of rugged terrain…valleys, mountainsides, and deep ravines. There were injuries, both to the animals and the riders, as well as animal deaths. When one rider lost her mule, she trekked the 18-mile delivery route on foot. These were some tough women.
With the current push towards censorship, book banning, and outright legislative attacks on libraries and bookstores, it seems we may once again need a service like this to deliver banned books to people who want to read them.
It saddens me to see how far we’ve fallen in just under a century. We used to have a passion for books, for reading, for knowledge. People would literally risk their lives to get books to people who wanted them, and their hard work was appreciated. Teachers and librarians used to be revered, looked up to, appreciated for educating people and spreading knowledge.
Now all that is being swept away with the stroke of a pen.
Perhaps we’ll see a publicly supported pack horse book project, an underground book-sharing service where people rescue banned books and get them into the hands of avid readers. It may sound like something out of Fahrenheit 451, but I think we’re closer to that than we realize.
RB
Great post and subject matter, Richard. I loved reading about the book women. I remember when households had sets of Encyclopedia Britannica and Encyclopedia Americana with pictures in their bookshelves, purchased from door to door salesmen. Growing up, I found those encyclopedias so fascinating to explore. The undoing of every bit of progress that was made is a tragic reality we are facing now. People worked, fought, and died for that progress, now it’s being erased and trashed.
Oh, I remember those encyclopedias! Haven’t thought about them in a long time, so thank you for the nudge.
All we can do is keep resisting and hope that more will join the cause. Thanks for stopping by, my friend!
I come from Hillbillies in Arkansas and West Virginia. I’ve heard my elders tell wonderful stories about travelling libraries, nurses, and preachers. They set up shop in the local Church, and they always had a crowd. Pentecostal, Methodist, Baptist, and Catholic (even an occasional snake charming revival) rotated one Sunday every month or so. My parents both read stories by Mark Twain through the traveling library. Mostly, they came in trucks, not horses, in the thirties. West Virginia did still have horses farther up in the Mountains. Both my parents had two books in their homes. The Bible and The Farmer’s Almanac. Wonderful subject. Wonderful inspiration for now and the months or years ahead.
Oh wow, that’s fantastic, Sandi! You got the chance to hear about it first-hand from people who experienced it.
Seems like this would be the good basis for a novel, don’t you think? 🙂
If you are writing it. I’m too lazy.
You are of course talking about the US. In Europe, we’re free to read what we want.
And you are so incredibly lucky to have that freedom, Sheree. Seems our freedoms are eroding a little more every day.
It’s really very shocking
Ugh, what?! Will we also delivery post by pigeons again?
I thought the benefit of living in an advanced world pretty much all that is realistic can be achieved, but I too often find myself saying: “it is the 21st century. How is this still not possible?!”
Sometimes, I feel like we are going back in time..
Almost like going 1 step forward, 2 steps back.
Yes, it is nice to know if there was ever life on Mars. But shouldn’t it be a priority to make life on earth a bit more accommodating.
Agreed…I sometimes wonder how we’ve gotten as far as we have when there is so much backsliding.
Maybe the book banning people would be happier on Mars. Leave the books here. I’ll take good care of them. 🙂
Loved this story. In western North Carolina after the hurricane last year, one woman did revive library service delivered by horse. I don’t know if it has since been halted by the slow recovery or now. In the spirit of the original Pack Horse Library project during the Great Depression, a modern initiative called the 21st Century Packhorse Librarian is bringing free books to rural communities in Western North Carolina, using a horse to deliver them. This project, founded by Kirsten Turner, aims to replicate the work of the original Pack Horse Librarians, who provided literature to remote Appalachian Mountain regions
So very cool! I’m glad to know that people are still working to get books to those who want them. Thanks for sharing, Pat. 🙂
Interesting!
Thank you.