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Dolly Parton's gift of reading to 1,000 Manx kids

Josh CannIsle of Man
BBC Country singer Dolly Parton, wearing a rhinestone-encrusted white suit, and playing a bejewelled guitar, on stage.BBC
More than 1,000 children on the Isle of Man have benefited from Dolly Parton's Imagination Library

More than 1,000 children on the Isle of Man have received books through Dolly Parton's Imagination Library since the scheme launched in Douglas at Christmas.

It posts a free book to every registered child each month until they turn five, and has since spread across most of the island's parishes.

Parton - a country star whose literacy campaigns have brought books to millions of children around the globe - died this week, aged 80.

"Dolly's vision has already had an extraordinary impact here on the Isle of Man," said Trish McDonough, who has been coordinating the scheme's roll-out locally.

Parton launched the Imagination Library in 1995 in her home county in Tennessee, as a tribute to her father, Robert Lee Parton, a sharecropper who never learned to read or write.

She called him "the smartest man I have ever known," but felt his illiteracy had held him back from his own ambitions.

imaginationlibrary.im A cardboard cut out of DOlly Parton infront of the BEE GEE statues imaginationlibrary.im
More than 3,500 books have already been posted to children on the island since the scheme launched at Christmas

Parton had hoped the scheme might, in her words, "go a couple of counties over," but it grew into a global programme reaching more than three million children a month.

"We feel incredibly privileged to play a part in continuing her legacy here on the Isle of Man," McDonough said.

imaginationlibrary.im A young baby reading a children's book on a kitchen floor. imaginationlibrary.im
Rose (14 months) from Foxdale, reading her book from the Imagination Library

Every baby born at the Jane Crookall Maternity Unit has automatically received a book since the end of February.

Registrations first opened in Douglas at Christmas, with the first books arriving in February.

More than 1,000 children have registered since launch, with 972 currently receiving books, and 54 who have since turned five and "graduated" from the scheme.

More than 3,500 books have been delivered to children across the island, with a further 871 on order for September.

Andreas, Ballaugh, Bride, Jurby, Lezayre and Maughold joined the scheme in March, after a community crowdfunding campaign was started locally.

Patrick, Marown, Port Erin, Port St Mary, Arbory and Rushen, Santon, Michael and Peel have all joined since.

Ramsey is now the subject of an active crowdfunding campaign, with organisers hoping to bring the Imagination Library to the town next.

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