SWAMPSCOTT — Residents are flocking to a little free library that recently popped up outside the Unitarian Universalist Church of Greater Lynn on Forest Avenue.
Little is an understatement, as the library is about the size of, and resembles, a birdhouse. A stop by the church on Tuesday showed that the mini house was almost filled with books left behind for potential patrons.
The Swampscott little free library on Forest Avenue joins more than 50,000 that are registered worldwide. The neighborhood book exchange allows anyone passing by the opportunity to take a book to read or leave a book for someone else to find.
The little libraries were originally designed to look like a one-room school or a house of books, but have since taken on a wide variety of shapes, sizes, and themes. The movement was started by Little Free Library, a nonprofit with a mission to inspire a love of reading, build community and spark creativity by fostering neighborhood book exchanges around the world.
Tonia Bandrowicz, chairwoman of the Unitarian Universalist Church’s Green Sanctuary Ministry Team, said she had not heard of the little free library concept — a brother of one of the team’s members had made the mini house and the team member wondered if it could be put up at the church.
Bandrowicz said she thought it was a great idea, and did some research on the little libraries. She sees them all over now. Supposedly, there’s another one in Swampscott at one of the beaches, and she knows there is one in Marblehead, she said.
The church’s little free library is sponsored by the green sanctuary team, which has a mission of promoting environmental education and sustainability within the church and in the larger community.
“They’re a really cool idea,” Bandrowicz said. “It’s a good way for the community to interact.”
Julian Baptista, the church’s director of community life and learning, said the library popped up over the summer.
“It came out because a few people had seen similar things and so we thought that it would be a good way to have people be able to share their ideas and the important books that were meaningful to them and share that with the community,” Baptista said.
“It seems like a trend that’s kind of caught on and public libraries are amazing and I think that we can all appreciate there being an extra library around.”
The libraries operate on the honor system, and depend on the community to keep them stocked with books — people can take a book, share it by returning it to the library or passing it onto a friend, or give books.
Baptista said there was some concern at first that people would take advantage of the library, that some kids might come along and take all the books out and not leave anything, but the house is actually stacked with more books now than when it started. He said the book exchange has been very successful.
The Rev. Dr. Victoria Weinstein, minister of the church, said the idea for the little library was also about a larger outreach to the community. She said the church is located in the woods at the end of a residential street.
“We want to have as much engagement as possible with people when they manage to find their way here for whatever reason or they get lost and find their way here, and that little library says, ‘hey, we all love learning and we want to connect in that way,’” Weinstein said.
She said the little libraries are a nice movement — she’s seen them outside people’s homes across the country. She said the church is having a lot of fun with theirs.
“Literature and literacy has always been a very important part of our religious tradition,” Weinstein said. “I thought it would express something about the values of the congregation in a simple, visible and interactive way. So, hey, thumbs up on that. I get excited anywhere where there’s books.”
