South Carolina promoting Little Free Libraries in rural areas that lack a public library

Officials in South Carolina are trying to promote reading in rural areas that lack a public library by holding a contest to encourage communities to open a Little Free Library, Savannah Lewis reports for WLTX 19 in Columbia. Donny Supplee, who has applied to build a little library, told Lewis, "With all the technology that's going out there I think books still have a place in our lives. I think getting kids involved in an early age—I think this will be a good way for them to go to a little mailbox, see a book that they can get, and I think it just involves a new way of getting out there." (The first Little Free Library built in 2009)

Little Free Library was started in 2009 by Wisconsin's Todd Bol, who built a one-room schoolhouse as a tribute to his mother, a former teacher. Bol filled the schoolhouse with books and encouraged his friends and neighbors to take the books for free. The first schoolhouse was so successful he built more. The organization now has a goal of building 2,510 libraries, the same number of free libraries Andrew Carnegie built around the turn of the 20th century.