Little Free Libraries are popping up all over the Morongo Basin, with the latest addition in Morongo Valley.
With locations in 29 Palms, Landers, and Yucca Valley, the most recent Little Free Library has been built on the corner of Rawson and Mecca about a mile up from Hwy 62. Community members Ray Kennedy and Foster Tucker are the stewards of this tin roofed book exchange, and while it’s only a foot tall and approximately three-feet wide, the works it currently houses span a large range; from the fantasy of J.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings to the non-fiction Los Angeles dystopia of Mike Davis’s City of Quartz.
Tucker said the Little Free Library was just one idea a group of neighbors devised to increase a sense of community on Rawson, soon to be followed by a community bulletin board right next to it. Kennedy attended a Little Free Library workshop at the Yucca Valley Library where he met other future stewards from Landers and Yucca Valley. The Little Free Library on Rawson was built by their neighbor Kit Smith, who serendipitously had already built one seven years ago in Orange County.
Including all 50 states of the U.S., Little Free Libraries is an international network in 120 countries, complete with a website and app that features maps of all locations around the world. Their mission is to be a catalyst for building community, inspiring readers, and expanding book access for all. Once a steward receives their official charter number, they’re sent a metal plaque to attach to their book exchange box, which Kennedy was applying with a screwdriver as we spoke. Kennedy said that publishers are also involved in the grassroots exchange:
“So I’m signed up as the steward and once a month I get a newsletter where there are offers of free books from publishers who have overstock to give away, so if I see something on the list that looks interesting I can just write in and say ‘I’m the steward of Little Free Library # 189747,’ and they’ll send books!”
