Pack Horse Library Project
The Pack Horse Library Project was a Works Progress Administration (WPA) program that delivered books to remote regions in the Appalachian Mountains between 1935 and 1943.
[3]: 57 Prior to the creation of the Pack Horse Library Project, many people in rural Appalachian Kentucky did not have access to books.
[4] People who lived in rural, mostly inaccessible areas wanted to become more literate, seeing education as a way to escape poverty.
[3]: 62 Elizabeth Fullerton, who worked with the women's and professional projects at the WPA, decided to reuse Stafford's idea.
[6][7]: 166 That started the first pack horse library, which was administered by the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) until the WPA took it over in 1935.
[12][3]: 62 The head librarian would process donations at the headquarters, repair books and get items ready to deliver.
[3]: 62 Librarians repurposed items like cheese boxes into card catalog files or license plates bent into shapes for bookends.
[5]: 120 Some routes were so steep that one book woman, Grace Caudill Lucas, had to lead her horse across the cliffs.
[3]: 70-71 Another unique aspect of the collection was the recipe and quilting pattern books that women created, writing down their favorites into binders which were shared throughout the area.
[18]: 708 Parent Teacher Associations (PTA) and women's clubs in Kentucky were key to helping raise money to purchase new books.
[19][8] In Paintsville, Kentucky, the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) helped pay shipping expenses for the books donated.
[18]: 707 The librarians managed to overcome the attitude to such a degree that one family was reported as refusing to move to a new county because it lacked a packhorse library service.
[28] Burkesville in Cumberland County started up a pack horse library in 1938 that had around 1,000 books and 3,000 magazines in the collection.
[29] To obtain books for a planned Floyd County library, an open house was held in Prestonsburg in 1938.
[24] The supervisor for Floyd county was Grace Moore Burchett, who oversaw services at Prestonsburg, Martin, Lackey and Wheelwright.
[13] The center was run by Ethel Perryman, who was a local director of the WPA, women's work division.
[17] One large central book distribution program was run out of Pittsburgh by Mrs. Malcolm McLeod, wife of the head of the English department at Carnegie Tech, who sent her donations to London.
[14] Paintsville, Kentucky revived its original pack horse library idea when the WPA funded it.
[26] It was estimated that it cost around $40 a month in rent and utilities to run the central facility for the pack horse library.
[38] Pine Mountain school was the headquarters for the pack horse library in Harlan County, which had been opened up by 1937.
