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New Little Free Library coming to north Macon neighborhood

The library was built by students at the Hutchings College and Career Academy

Tucked away in parks and even in some front yards, you may find little libraries that kind of look like birdhouses.

Inside you'll find books you can take to read, free of charge. They only ask you leave a book in return.

Those are Little Free Libraries, and the newest one will be added to the Lake Wildwood subdivision by the Alpha Rho chapter of Lambda Kappa Mu Sorority on Friday.

To celebrate, the chapter is hosting a grand-opening event that is free and open to the public at Lake Wildwood's playground.

The celebration will have contests and book giveaways, as well as refreshments and a book reading. Kids are encouraged to come dressed as their favorite book characters.

Vice President for the chapter Lisa Solomon says promoting literacy is a passion of the sorority. They've hosted book drives in Macon in the past.

"A lot of our sorority members are educators, and so literacy is definitely important to us, and this is something that we want to give back to our community and be a blessing," Solomon said.

Little Free Library is a nonprofit organization that allows people to become 'stewards' of little libraries and place them wherever they want. Then, they register the library with the network.

There are currently four little libraries registered with Little Free Library in Macon, but this will be the first for the Alpha Rho chapter.

Credit: Jaclyn Ramkissoon
The Little Free Library located in Macon's Dog Park on Chestnut Street

And they don't plan on stopping at just one.

"We want to add one in the Hillcrest area of town and the east Macon side of town by the end of 2019," Solomon said.

Solomon says the sorority looks to see where there is a need for books.

"We saw a need in the Lake Wildwood area, and we see a need on the east side of town and the Hillcrest area, and then also after next year we see adding more," Solomon said.

The library was built by students at the Hutchings College and Career Academy, and Solomon says working with the kids feels awesome.

"We are very excited with the students at the Hutchings College and Career Academy to help us, along with Mr. James Miller, so we do thank them for that," Solomon said. 

Miles Terry, a senior at Hutchings, says 24 students worked together for a week to build the library, under the instruction of their teacher, James Miller. They first made a mock design out of foam board, then moved onto their real design.

"We had to make the glass clear so people could see what items are already in here, what they can take and what they can put back in," Terry said. "And then we just made a little hinge on the door.... to make sure the door stays closed while its stationary."

Credit: Jaclyn Ramkissoon
Hutchings' students made a mock model, on the right, out of foam board before moving onto the actual library, on the left.

Terry says he loves working with other students to come up with ideas.

"It's very fun combining different ideas and using different processes to implement into building this final product," Terry said. "And also it's using complex strategy, skills to solve this, because it's a lot of tedious process that goes into this."

At the end of the day, the students say they're proud of their work.

"It's a great feeling and to also know that it will be used to bring good to the community, where people can leave stuff and actually take stuff, so I'm glad that I can do my part to contribute to helping out the community," Terry said. 

The sorority will have its grand-opening celebration on Friday, Dec. 21 from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. at Lake Wildwood's playground.

The event is free and open to the public. Solomon says even though it's a gated community, someone will be there to let people in to enjoy the event.

If you would like to donate books to the Macon chapter of Lambda Kappa Mu Sorority, you can email them at alpharho.lkm@gmail.com

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