April 23, 2025 • 12 mins
Today we highlight and celebrate a couple of alternative libraries.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hey, and welcome to the short Stuff. I'm Josh, and
there's chalk and we're sitting in for day today and
this is short stuff.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
That's right, and we are here today to talk about
This is sort of a two parter in one about
I'm just calling this all to libraries as an alternative libraries.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
One reason is because I was on a walk the
other day and we have quite a few little free
libraries in our neighborhood and they are all super cute.
If you don't know what we're talking about, little boxes,
usually in the shape of a house, or it could
be a doghouse, or it could be a literal library
or schoolhouse, just some sort of small housey type structure
(00:42):
with a little clear door, and inside are our books
that you can take a book, you can take a
couple of books, you can leave a book. And it's
just one of the great things. And I grabbed one.
I usually don't even look at them that much because
I just have too many books I'm behind on already,
but I one popped up in my peripheral vision that
would be perfect for Ruby. So I grabbed it, and
(01:02):
she's reading it and loving it, and so I thought
we should do a little ode to alt libraries like this.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
What was the book.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
I can't remember, the Last Kids on Earth or something
like that.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Well, that sounds good.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
That may not be the title, but that's sort of
the premise.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
Is she she might be told for this, but maybe not.
Has she ever read any of the scary stories to
tell in the Dark books?
Speaker 2 (01:27):
I don't think. And it is actually called The Last
Kids on Earth. It looks like it's a series. No,
that sounds like something right, a p rally though.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Okay, go to eBay and find whatever editions came out
in the eighties. Okay, because they have some of the
greatest illustrations ever that made everything so much more unsettling.
You have to get those watercolor illustrations or else. Don't
even bother.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
I'm looking at them now and they are terrifying.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
They are. It's so great. I remember being a kid
and just being like, this is so great. I feel
so alive.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Thanks for the wreck.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Yeah, there's also more scary stories of Tonnel in Dark
pretty much equally good.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
So maybe we should flip it and start with little
Free your Libraries. Since I mentioned that one first as Inspirado,
but in twenty nine how the story goes, and this
is straight from their website. A man named Todd Bowle
from Wisconsin, Hudson, Wisconsin started it all when he built
a little model of a schoolhouse, of a little one
room schoolhouse, is a tribute to his mom, who's a teacher,
(02:30):
put it on a post, put some books in it,
and said, hey, everyone, if you want a book, take one.
If you want to drop one off, that'd be great too,
And it was a big hit.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
It was a huge hit. Actually, So apparently Andrew Carnegie
funded I believe twenty five hundred plus. For some reason,
everybody says twenty five hundred and eight, so I'm guessing
that's the number public libraries around the turn of the
last century or early last century, and there's still plenty
around that. He essentially partnered with whatever local government and
(03:04):
said I'll give you a bunch of money, or I'll
throw in half or something like that, and that was
one of the big pieces of philanthropy he was known for.
So I guess Todd bowl and Rick Brooks said let's
try to see if we can make twenty five hundred
and eight of these things by the end of twenty thirteen,
which was a couple of years after they started, and
(03:24):
they just blew that goal out of the water.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Yeah. Rich Brooks was the guy, like he said, he
partnered with He actually retired from the which is now
NGO in twenty fourteen, but he, you know, there were
pals and he thought it was a great idea, and
again inspired by Carnegie, they set out to start building
these by twenty ten. So in twenty nine is when
the first one was built. By twenty ten, it was
(03:49):
like an established thing that was happening. They started to
give them away. They had charter signs if it was
an official one engraved with a charter number, and it
just people were into it and they start, you know,
you see one of these things in your neighborhood. I
remember when I saw the first one, I was like, wow,
that's an incredible idea. And it felt like within that
year we had like six or seven more.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
Yeah. I remember the first time I saw when I
didn't get the concept. So I kind of brought it
down a book that I wanted, and so I looked
around to make sure no one was looking, and put
it in my jacket and ran off really quick.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Thought you got a bunch of books and you sold
money bay.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
No, I just took one and sold it on eBay. Yeah, eventually.
But I said that when they started, they wanted to
make twenty five hundred and eight of these things within
a couple of years. They ended up surpassing that with
a year and a half left before their goal date,
and they just kept going from there. Apparently, Chuck, here's
(04:50):
some mind boggling numbers for you. So they started into
two thousand and nine. In twenty twenty two, there were
more than one hundred and fifty thousand Little Free Library
credible across the world, in one hundred and twenty different countries.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Yeah. I did not know it had gone international until
I started doing this research. It's just incredible, Like I said,
Brooks retired in twenty fourteen. Someone actually wrote in twenty
fifteen a woman named Margaret. Oh, she's a pretty famous author. Actually,
Margaret Aldrich wrote the Little Free Library book. So all
(05:25):
of a sudden, it's like launching books in and of itself.
They got in twenty fourteen that same year the Library
of Congress Literacy Award. Just like people are lauding it.
People are building these things like crazy, and it's just
become one of the cool things that the you know,
started here in the US and then spread all over
the place. Very sadly, in twenty eighteen, Todd Bowle passed
(05:49):
away from pancreatic cancer after the launch of their seventy
five thousandth at the time Little Free Library, and he
was working for them up until the end and has
a great quote, I really believe in a little free
library on every block and a book in every hand.
I believe people can fix their neighborhoods, fix their communities,
develop systems of sharing, learn from each other, and see
(06:11):
that they have a better place in this planet to live.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
Very sweet. That's a great last interview quote.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Yeah, pretty awesome.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
All right, Well, let's take a break and we'll come
back and talk about a different kind of alt library
after this stop Stop put the stop show, okay, Chuck.
(06:55):
So we already talked about little free libraries, which anybody
can make. And if you want some tips, like we said,
go check out the Little Free Library book. If you
saw that in a little free library, wouldn't the universe
is collapse in on itself.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Yeah. You can also donate to them, of course.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
Yeah, it's that kind of give a book take a
book thing. I don't know if we spelled it out
or if we needed to, but that's the premise of it, right.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Another thing was called the Human Library, and this was
the result of a couple of who I take to
be artists, brothers, Ronnie Abergail and Danny Abergil. They yeah,
they for a festival in Denmark about the year two thousand.
They created the Human Library. In Danish, they call it
(07:38):
menesque BiblioTech it but all one word.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Yeah, BiblioTech is that's in a lot of languages, right.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
Sure, but you add the et to the end and
you got Danish, that's right. So they what they created
with this human Library was the concept that the books
were human beings, and they were human beings that people
might want to get information from. So there were human
beings who were typically look down upon, mistreated, had different
(08:09):
experiences from the mainstream. So you had like books that
were trans people, unhoused people, people from different races, and
you can check out one of these books, this human book,
and hang out with them and ask them whatever question
you want, and then you take them back and check
out another one.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
Yeah. It's sort of part performance art, part ted talking
away just kind of referring to them as books, as
was the hook I think, and obviously something to you know,
draw attention to their cause, which is very noble. I
think it started out as a small festival and I
think it ran eight hours a day for over four
(08:48):
days initially with fifty human books available, and now it
is an international thing. They have human libraries in Asia, Africa, Australia,
both of the Americas and Europe.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
Yeah. I thought this is kind of cute too. So
if you're a volunteer as a book, you go through
a vetting process and then they teach you how to
do this and they call that getting published. And then
once you're published, you can be checked out. And the
rules for readers are that you respect the book, be curious,
bring the book back on time and in the same condition.
(09:25):
I'm keeping this book if you read between the lines.
I think bring it back in the same condition means
that they don't want any pages stuck together with a booker.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Yeah, don't make your book to your dishes, don't put
your book to work. That's not what this is about.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Well, luckily, the book can end the loan anytime they want,
like if things go pear shaped they can be like,
I'm taking myself back to the library.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
Yeah, just stamp my forehead so I can leave, right.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
They also have mobile libraries called book depots. The headquarters
for this that it just carried on for the last
couple of decades. It's headquartered in Copenhagen, but they have
mobile libraries and I guess they just go round up
the books and they're like, sorry, you're you're published. They'll
come in with us on the road for a little while.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
Yeah, you can also like book a group of books
or you know, check out a group of books at
one time. Like a company can do this, and companies
have done this. They'll you know, it's something that companies do.
They'll bring in like guest speakers and stuff, and in
this case they're doing it in the form of human books.
They'll bring in a few different people to bring in
to talk about, you know, things that again just sort
(10:34):
of like an individual would like, hey, let's bring in
some people that maybe don't even work on our field,
but might enlighten you to some diverse topics and people
and ways of thinking. So like Microsoft and Eli, Lilly
and other brands have gotten together to kind of do
this over the years.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
Yes, and I think invariably at all of those events
there's at least one person who raises their hand and says, so, wait,
this is just Q and.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
A, right, Like, I don't get it.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
What's the library thing? I don't Yeah, I'm totally confused. Yeah,
and they probably don't get very much out of the
experience exactly.
Speaker 2 (11:08):
Those people never do. But yeah, it's just sort of
a fun hook. I like stuff like this. Some people
might say it's silly go through notebooks are just people
and it's just a Q and A. But I encourage
people like that to sort of broaden their horizons, think
outside the old box a little bit and CTFD.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Yeah, just make sure that the person you're dragging off
to be checked out is a published book. And that's
some rando.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
No, you don't want to do that. Hey, you're coming
with me. That's called kid that's called kidnapping.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
Right, you got anything else?
Speaker 2 (11:39):
I got nothing else. Support Little Free Library, support the
Human Book Project.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
And support all libraries too.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
Yeah, those are great.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
Also, short stuff is.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
That Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio.
For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app
Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Hey, and welcome to the short Stuff. I'm Josh, and
there's chalk and we're sitting in for day today and
this is short stuff.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
That's right, and we are here today to talk about
This is sort of a two parter in one about
I'm just calling this all to libraries as an alternative libraries.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
One reason is because I was on a walk the
other day and we have quite a few little free
libraries in our neighborhood and they are all super cute.
If you don't know what we're talking about, little boxes,
usually in the shape of a house, or it could
be a doghouse, or it could be a literal library
or schoolhouse, just some sort of small housey type structure
(00:42):
with a little clear door, and inside are our books
that you can take a book, you can take a
couple of books, you can leave a book. And it's
just one of the great things. And I grabbed one.
I usually don't even look at them that much because
I just have too many books I'm behind on already,
but I one popped up in my peripheral vision that
would be perfect for Ruby. So I grabbed it, and
(01:02):
she's reading it and loving it, and so I thought
we should do a little ode to alt libraries like this.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
What was the book.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
I can't remember, the Last Kids on Earth or something
like that.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Well, that sounds good.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
That may not be the title, but that's sort of
the premise.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
Is she she might be told for this, but maybe not.
Has she ever read any of the scary stories to
tell in the Dark books?
Speaker 2 (01:27):
I don't think. And it is actually called The Last
Kids on Earth. It looks like it's a series. No,
that sounds like something right, a p rally though.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Okay, go to eBay and find whatever editions came out
in the eighties. Okay, because they have some of the
greatest illustrations ever that made everything so much more unsettling.
You have to get those watercolor illustrations or else. Don't
even bother.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
I'm looking at them now and they are terrifying.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
They are. It's so great. I remember being a kid
and just being like, this is so great. I feel
so alive.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Thanks for the wreck.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Yeah, there's also more scary stories of Tonnel in Dark
pretty much equally good.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
So maybe we should flip it and start with little
Free your Libraries. Since I mentioned that one first as Inspirado,
but in twenty nine how the story goes, and this
is straight from their website. A man named Todd Bowle
from Wisconsin, Hudson, Wisconsin started it all when he built
a little model of a schoolhouse, of a little one
room schoolhouse, is a tribute to his mom, who's a teacher,
(02:30):
put it on a post, put some books in it,
and said, hey, everyone, if you want a book, take one.
If you want to drop one off, that'd be great too,
And it was a big hit.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
It was a huge hit. Actually, So apparently Andrew Carnegie
funded I believe twenty five hundred plus. For some reason,
everybody says twenty five hundred and eight, so I'm guessing
that's the number public libraries around the turn of the
last century or early last century, and there's still plenty
around that. He essentially partnered with whatever local government and
(03:04):
said I'll give you a bunch of money, or I'll
throw in half or something like that, and that was
one of the big pieces of philanthropy he was known for.
So I guess Todd bowl and Rick Brooks said let's
try to see if we can make twenty five hundred
and eight of these things by the end of twenty thirteen,
which was a couple of years after they started, and
(03:24):
they just blew that goal out of the water.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Yeah. Rich Brooks was the guy, like he said, he
partnered with He actually retired from the which is now
NGO in twenty fourteen, but he, you know, there were
pals and he thought it was a great idea, and
again inspired by Carnegie, they set out to start building
these by twenty ten. So in twenty nine is when
the first one was built. By twenty ten, it was
(03:49):
like an established thing that was happening. They started to
give them away. They had charter signs if it was
an official one engraved with a charter number, and it
just people were into it and they start, you know,
you see one of these things in your neighborhood. I
remember when I saw the first one, I was like, wow,
that's an incredible idea. And it felt like within that
year we had like six or seven more.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
Yeah. I remember the first time I saw when I
didn't get the concept. So I kind of brought it
down a book that I wanted, and so I looked
around to make sure no one was looking, and put
it in my jacket and ran off really quick.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Thought you got a bunch of books and you sold
money bay.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
No, I just took one and sold it on eBay. Yeah, eventually.
But I said that when they started, they wanted to
make twenty five hundred and eight of these things within
a couple of years. They ended up surpassing that with
a year and a half left before their goal date,
and they just kept going from there. Apparently, Chuck, here's
(04:50):
some mind boggling numbers for you. So they started into
two thousand and nine. In twenty twenty two, there were
more than one hundred and fifty thousand Little Free Library
credible across the world, in one hundred and twenty different countries.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Yeah. I did not know it had gone international until
I started doing this research. It's just incredible, Like I said,
Brooks retired in twenty fourteen. Someone actually wrote in twenty
fifteen a woman named Margaret. Oh, she's a pretty famous author. Actually,
Margaret Aldrich wrote the Little Free Library book. So all
(05:25):
of a sudden, it's like launching books in and of itself.
They got in twenty fourteen that same year the Library
of Congress Literacy Award. Just like people are lauding it.
People are building these things like crazy, and it's just
become one of the cool things that the you know,
started here in the US and then spread all over
the place. Very sadly, in twenty eighteen, Todd Bowle passed
(05:49):
away from pancreatic cancer after the launch of their seventy
five thousandth at the time Little Free Library, and he
was working for them up until the end and has
a great quote, I really believe in a little free
library on every block and a book in every hand.
I believe people can fix their neighborhoods, fix their communities,
develop systems of sharing, learn from each other, and see
(06:11):
that they have a better place in this planet to live.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
Very sweet. That's a great last interview quote.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Yeah, pretty awesome.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
All right, Well, let's take a break and we'll come
back and talk about a different kind of alt library
after this stop Stop put the stop show, okay, Chuck.
(06:55):
So we already talked about little free libraries, which anybody
can make. And if you want some tips, like we said,
go check out the Little Free Library book. If you
saw that in a little free library, wouldn't the universe
is collapse in on itself.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Yeah. You can also donate to them, of course.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
Yeah, it's that kind of give a book take a
book thing. I don't know if we spelled it out
or if we needed to, but that's the premise of it, right.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Another thing was called the Human Library, and this was
the result of a couple of who I take to
be artists, brothers, Ronnie Abergail and Danny Abergil. They yeah,
they for a festival in Denmark about the year two thousand.
They created the Human Library. In Danish, they call it
(07:38):
menesque BiblioTech it but all one word.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Yeah, BiblioTech is that's in a lot of languages, right.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
Sure, but you add the et to the end and
you got Danish, that's right. So they what they created
with this human Library was the concept that the books
were human beings, and they were human beings that people
might want to get information from. So there were human
beings who were typically look down upon, mistreated, had different
(08:09):
experiences from the mainstream. So you had like books that
were trans people, unhoused people, people from different races, and
you can check out one of these books, this human book,
and hang out with them and ask them whatever question
you want, and then you take them back and check
out another one.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
Yeah. It's sort of part performance art, part ted talking
away just kind of referring to them as books, as
was the hook I think, and obviously something to you know,
draw attention to their cause, which is very noble. I
think it started out as a small festival and I
think it ran eight hours a day for over four
(08:48):
days initially with fifty human books available, and now it
is an international thing. They have human libraries in Asia, Africa, Australia,
both of the Americas and Europe.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
Yeah. I thought this is kind of cute too. So
if you're a volunteer as a book, you go through
a vetting process and then they teach you how to
do this and they call that getting published. And then
once you're published, you can be checked out. And the
rules for readers are that you respect the book, be curious,
bring the book back on time and in the same condition.
(09:25):
I'm keeping this book if you read between the lines.
I think bring it back in the same condition means
that they don't want any pages stuck together with a booker.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Yeah, don't make your book to your dishes, don't put
your book to work. That's not what this is about.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Well, luckily, the book can end the loan anytime they want,
like if things go pear shaped they can be like,
I'm taking myself back to the library.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
Yeah, just stamp my forehead so I can leave, right.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
They also have mobile libraries called book depots. The headquarters
for this that it just carried on for the last
couple of decades. It's headquartered in Copenhagen, but they have
mobile libraries and I guess they just go round up
the books and they're like, sorry, you're you're published. They'll
come in with us on the road for a little while.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
Yeah, you can also like book a group of books
or you know, check out a group of books at
one time. Like a company can do this, and companies
have done this. They'll you know, it's something that companies do.
They'll bring in like guest speakers and stuff, and in
this case they're doing it in the form of human books.
They'll bring in a few different people to bring in
to talk about, you know, things that again just sort
(10:34):
of like an individual would like, hey, let's bring in
some people that maybe don't even work on our field,
but might enlighten you to some diverse topics and people
and ways of thinking. So like Microsoft and Eli, Lilly
and other brands have gotten together to kind of do
this over the years.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
Yes, and I think invariably at all of those events
there's at least one person who raises their hand and says, so, wait,
this is just Q and.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
A, right, Like, I don't get it.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
What's the library thing? I don't Yeah, I'm totally confused. Yeah,
and they probably don't get very much out of the
experience exactly.
Speaker 2 (11:08):
Those people never do. But yeah, it's just sort of
a fun hook. I like stuff like this. Some people
might say it's silly go through notebooks are just people
and it's just a Q and A. But I encourage
people like that to sort of broaden their horizons, think
outside the old box a little bit and CTFD.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Yeah, just make sure that the person you're dragging off
to be checked out is a published book. And that's
some rando.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
No, you don't want to do that. Hey, you're coming
with me. That's called kid that's called kidnapping.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
Right, you got anything else?
Speaker 2 (11:39):
I got nothing else. Support Little Free Library, support the
Human Book Project.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
And support all libraries too.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
Yeah, those are great.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
Also, short stuff is.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
That Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio.
For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app
Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
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