This week (Oct. 15-21) is National Friends of The Libraries Week [1]! To celebrate the efforts of our Friends at the Metro, we will share the stories of some of our Friends volunteers and what the experience means to them.

FOL Week

Friends Volunteer Story: Joe McReynolds 

He did not expect to become a Friends of the Library volunteer, but 30 years later as the Friends Warehouse Manager, he says they are doing much more than selling books at the book sale. The Friends are giving back to the community.

The Friends of the Metropolitan Library system give a large percentage of everything they make back to local libraries each year. Since the organization’s inception in 1981 they have given back over $4 million, but Warehouse Manager Joe McReynolds says it is much more than that.

McReynolds wife got him interested in the book sale before they got married. She invited him to go after work on a Friday night, and after years of attending the sale, someone asked him if he was interested in volunteering. And the rest, as they say, is history.

After thirty years of volunteering, McReynolds said he has had a number of heartwarming experiences with book sale customers, but the one thing that comes to mind is the families.

“I couldn’t tell you the number of times we will have someone come up with two or three kids and maybe 15 books. They will look at them and we will count them and they say they need to put one back because they don’t have enough money,” McReynolds said.

McReynolds never lets them put a book back because they do not have the extra 50 cents or dollar that the Friends charge at the book sale.

“We put a lot of books in the hands of people who maybe could not afford to buy them at retail prices,” he said. “We are raising money for the library but we also get books into the community.”

After the sale is over, the Friends do not throw anything away. Some are bought by resellers, some are donated to other organizations, and damaged books are bought by recycling companies who turn the books into things like paper and boxes.