Well-educated and interested in many topics, Heard was described by an acquaintance as "one of those magnificent Victorian women who had a super-charged energy, which home life could never use up".

[1] Heard was born in Newton County, Georgia in 1853 to John H. Harper and Susan Rebecca Oliver.

St. John went on to contact Andrew Carnegie, who donated $1,000 towards the effort and called Heard "the right woman at the right time".

Heard also traveled to New York City, where she met with book editors and publishing houses to establish business agreements and request donations,[4] and then back to Georgia via the Eastern seaboard, recruiting librarians across six states along the way.

[5] Her overall efforts were so successful that the New York Daily Tribune noted that the donations "enabled [Heard] to send the boxes in all directions.

[8] The traveling library system won a gold medal award at the 1907 Jamestown Exposition in Virginia.

[1] Sarah and Eugene Heard had two children, an older daughter, Susan ("Sue"), and a younger son,[5] Thomas, who died at the age of 12.