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Comment by Aboutplants | Hacker News Reader

“Dolly Parton's Imagination Library has gifted over 318 million free books to children worldwide since its inception”

Amazing contributions to many aspects of life

Daughter loves getting these in the mail, and this paragraph is absolutely right!

>> That year, Parton explained that as well as improving child literacy, “it’s the fact they get recognised. They get this little book with their little name on it in the mail, and they feel special. They start taking pride in themselves, and they know that somebody out there is thinking of [them].”

My son loves them too!

I'm in a borough of London, and did a bit of a double-take when they told me that Dolly Parton would be sending my daughter a book every month. But indeed she did, and it had exactly that effect, and now she's an absolutely avid reader.

Thank you, Dolly. That meant a lot to us, and millions upon millions of other people too.

Very much this.

My kid's nursery gave out books from Dolly. It was a little ceremony, my kid loved it. We still have them.

But I was really surprised, I thought it was joke, why would Dolly care about my Kid's reading? but she really did. She really did care about a bunch of kids in inner city london.

Obviously I am not blessed with millions, but Dolly does lead by example. I need to do better.

Perhaps then, rather than flying flags at half-mast, it'd be better to send that-many books to children around the world. Sadly it seems people calling the shots, the strong of the day, are more interested in delivering threats and ultimatums, rather than what shiny Dolly did.

What an apparent demonstration that not everyone is gifted the same amount of generosity.

You can donate to her charity.

Probably better than whichever flavor of ideological bullshit our politicians would send, anyway.

When my daughter turned five and received her final book in the mail, it came with a letter that still makes me tear up.

As a kid growing up in Tennessee I was the beneficiary of several of her reading programs. They really helped to foster a sense of curiosity and wonder that live with me to this day. Dolly was a real one, she'll definitely be missed.

How much do you remember these books your family was gifted before you were five years old? I thought it was more of a program to increase literacy. Personally, I remember books from when I was pre-kindergarten, but I don't typically think of them as "fostering a sense of curiosity and wonder", though, ultimately, I guess they did.

I just think it is an interesting topic in the framing of content policing and what not, it would be interesting to know what you took from the program.

She also had a program that gave a free book to elementary school kids every year (as a part of the local book fair). The first technical book I ever owned was a very basic intro to html that I received as a part of that program.

Reading this made me choke up. That’s beautiful.

> How much do you remember these books your family was gifted before you were five years old?

I remember nothing of the books that were read to me before I was five. However, I was five when I picked up a book that my mother had been reading to me and found, for the first time, that I could read it myself. I suspect that it worked out that way for me because she'd been reading to me for years before that.

Yeah, it is such an amazing program that was just executed in the right way. She didn't see it hit the billion books like she wanted to in her lifetime, but I'm sure they will get there. I would love to know other examples of philanthropy like that are similar in impact?

[1] https://imaginationlibrary.com/ [2] https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/03/01/589912466/dolly-p...

My toddler gets a book a month in the mail from Dolly's Imagination Library and we keep reading some almost every day. She's made an impact in so many families <3

Accomplishments like these are standards we should use for when to build someone a statue

Interesting program, seems mostly positive, some dissent

https://cdr.lib.unc.edu/concern/dissertations/mw22vh301

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02702711.2019.16...

https://ila.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/rrq.7010...

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Judith-Butler/publicati...

I think any dissent has to be from the kind of person who just has to find something wrong with everything. I cannot imagine a legitimate criticism of her program to give free books to every kid.

Has anyone successfully rallied their county to get this program enacted? Seems a lot of Cali zip codes are not available…

I agree but I came across Dolly Parton syrup in the grocery store once. Had to say for all the good, that felt a bit odd, strange and out of place with Dolly’s character.

Huh, looks she has an entire food line. Wonder if this is planned to be an income stream for some of her charities, similar to Newman's Own.

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