About

We are not out to start the proposed national library endowment by ourselves. Instead we hope that wealthy philanthropists with far more resources will take an interest in the cause, especially since some of the very richest people “credit their success to reading.” More details here. Ideally conferences can happen between librarians, prospective donors, and other major stakeholders to refine the endowment vision (not set in stone!).

Interested in volunteering? Catch up with co-founder David Rothman at drothman@libraryendowment.org or 703-370-6540.

Among the participants in LibraryEndowment.org, an offshoot of LibraryCity, are:

Jim Duncan, our Strategy Consultant. He is Executive Director of the Colorado Library Consortium. Jim’s views are his own. But they reflect the needs of cash-strapped small town libraries and others the consortium serves. The words “library evangelists” pretty much cover what Jim and the rest of us are up to. He holds a masters degree in library and information science from the University of Iowa. Contact Jim at jduncan@libraryendowment.org or 720-739-3679.

Corilee Christou, our Ohio-based Director of Publisher and Library Relations Emeritus. Corilee has worked in public, K-12, and academic libraries, as well as for Reed Publishing, former owner of Library Journal, School Library Journal, and Publishers Weekly. Among other achievements, Corilee was among the people responsible for those PW blurbs on the Amazon site. Corilee holds a masters in library science from Simmons College. LibraryEndowment.org is now looking for Corilee’s replacement as director of publisher and library relations.

David Rothman, a co-founder. He’s a former poverty beat reporter with a passion for digital and educational divide issues. David is not a librarian but has been a library advocate since the early 1990s. He founded and publishes the TeleRead, the oldest site devoted to news and views on ebooks. As a freelancer, David has appeared in Library Journal, Publisher’s Weekly, Education Week, the Chronicle of Higher Education, the Washington Post, and elsewhere. He is author of The Silicon Jungle and other books. David’s email is drothman@libraryendowment.org; his number, 703-370-6540.

Photo credit: The shot of the young Poe-reader on the home page is Creative Commons-licensed and is from the Unquiet Library (not associated with this site).