Two Lake Zurich women with a passion for helping the people of Appalachia have collected more than 8,000 books for a West Virginia community, and now they are seeking financial help to get the books there.
Shari Gullo and Diane Myers recently collected the books in cooperation with Step by Step, an organization dedicated to serving West Virginia children in economically challenged communities throughout the southern coalfields of West Virginia, the Charleston Gazette-Mail reported.
Gullo says she wanted to hold a book drive after learning that West Virginia’s Big Ugly community needed books.
“I couldn’t imagine being 40 miles from a library without any books,” said Gullo. “If even one kid goes to college because I did this, that will make me happy.”
She and Myers ended up receiving about 7,000 pounds of books but say they don’t have the money to ship the 8,000 books to West Virginia.
A company has agreed to give Gullo a low rate to ship the books. She expects the total cost, including shrink wrap, to be about $1,000, and asked that anyone wanting to help contact her at pizzabones@msn.com.
