Book Harvest – Mebane Charitable Foundation

15 Years of Inspiring Readers: Book Harvest’s 2026 Dream Big Celebration

January 29, 2026/in Book Harvest/by Mebane Foundation

The Mebane Foundation is proud to share exciting news from Book Harvest, one of our most valued partners. For 15 years, Book Harvest has been building a culture of reading for children and families by ensuring access to high-quality, age-appropriate books in the home—where a lifelong love of learning begins.

At the heart of this mission is Dream Big, Book Harvest’s signature community book drive and family celebration. Designed to bring families and volunteers together, Dream Big centers on stories, choice, and the simple magic of growing up surrounded by books. The event is fueled by generosity and guided by the belief that every child deserves an abundant home library.

I met Founder Ginger Young in 2017 and was immediately impressed by her vision for early childhood literacy and her commitment to making sure all children have access to engaging books in their own homes. Supporting her mission was an easy decision. Since its founding in 2011, Book Harvest has distributed more than 3 million books to children and families in Durham and the surrounding areas. Over the years, we have been proud to sponsor Book Babies, the Big Dream Book Drive, and the Summer Block Party.

This partnership reflects our shared commitment to literacy, opportunity, and the power of books to shape brighter futures for children across our region. – Larry Colbourne, president of the Mebane Foundation.

Republished with permission from Book Harvest and author Gabby Bunnell.

15 Years of Dreaming Big: Book Harvest’s 2026 Dream Big Book Drive & Community Celebration

Monday was a day to remember! At Book Harvest’s 15th Annual Dream Big Book Drive & Community Celebration, our incredible community brought in 22,861 books in just 3 hours!

22,861!

That’s 22,861 books carried from home to a book drive, book drive to car, car to Boxyard…all to be individually counted, balanced, sorted, stacked, re-boxed, and loaded onto a truck bound for Book Harvest. Dream Big has always been about aiming for these ambitious numbers that are, quite frankly, hard to fathom: we hope these photos and recap can give you just a peek into the process.

More than 200 volunteers filled Boxyard RTP on Monday in varying shifts, partaking in jobs such as collecting data on book drives, boxing and labeling sorted books, running our Family Volunteer Area, and (critically) handing out hot chocolate tokens.

Throughout the constant shuffle of precarious book stacks and carts, family fun was abundant through bookmark making, Polaroid taking, face painting, and more. The famous Poetry Fox even made an appearance, typing away on the 2nd floor with a picturesque backdrop of flurrying books below. In the parking lot, children and families were able to explore a GoDurhamNC bus, a City of Durham dump truck, a Gateway Building contruction truck, a Two Men and a Truck moving truck, and of course, the ever-looming characters of the Paperhand Puppet Project!

In the middle of the event’s hard work and celebration, our CEO and Founder, Ginger Young, alongside Book Harvest Durham’s Executive Director, Tabitha Blackwell, announced a Book Harvest milestone years in the making: over 3,000,000 Book Harvest books have been harvested by children since our founding in 2011! Over 582,000 of those books have been sourced from Book Harvest’s 15 Dream Big Book Drives alone, and as Ginger remarked at the event: “That’s a lot of home libraries.”

Tabitha and Ginger announce the 3 millionth book harvested by children since Book Harvest was founded in 2011.

The day’s joy culminated in the Paperhand Puppet Project’s parade around the parking lot, where children transformed into cats, birds, fish, and monarch butterflies held up to the sky. The community’s mutual love and investment was palpable, bringing a sense of needed togetherness and hope as we honor Dr. King’s legacy and set out into this new year.

We extend warm and resounding gratitude to all of our community members who ran a book drive, showed up to volunteer, and celebrated with us on Monday. And of course, thank you to our Book Harvest Durham Sponsors–including PNC, Subaru Southpoint, and Scholastic–for supporting Dream Big and our work in Durham all year long!

And remember, the big dreams don’t stop here! The Dream Big Book Drive continues through January 31. Every book donated between December 1 and January 31 counts toward our final total, so there’s still plenty of time to host a book drive or clean off your own shelves to contribute to this year’s tally. Learn more here and stay tuned for our final number at the end of the month.

15th Annual Dream Big Book Drive & Community Celebration Photo Gallery

GINGER YOUNG NAMED CEO OF BOOK HARVEST

February 4, 2022/in Book Harvest/by Merit

The Mebane Foundation is pleased to share this exciting news from Book Harvest, one of our most valued partners. I met Founder Ginger Young back in 2017 and was impressed by her vision for early childhood literacy and her desire to ensure that all children have access to engaging, age-appropriate books in their own homes. Supporting her mission was an easy decision. Over the past ten years, Book Harvest has placed more than 1.6 million books into the hands of children in Durham and the surrounding area. Now, as Book Harvest enters its second decade, we will be cheering Ginger on as she pours that same passion and boundless energy into transforming the literacy landscape in other communities across the state and the nation. ~Larry Coulborne, President of the Mebane Foundation

GINGER YOUNG NAMED CEO OF BOOK HARVEST: New Role Sets Organization on Path of Expansion

Durham, NC, February 1, 2022 — Sarah Wood, Chair of the Book Harvest Board of Directors, announced today that Ginger Young, Book Harvest’s Founder and Executive Director for the past 10 years, has been named Chief Executive Officer of Book Harvest. In this new role, Young will develop key strategies to leverage the successes of the organization’s first decade in Durham, North Carolina to transform the childhood literacy landscape in other communities across the state and beyond.

Wood explained, “Our first ten years in Durham have proven that Book Harvest knows how to ensure that all children have access to free books from birth, to support families so they nourish their children’s early language development, and to create a community-wide culture of childhood literacy. Now more than ever – when less than half of all children who live in poverty enter kindergarten ready to learn – we have an imperative and an obligation to bring what we know to other communities.”

In her new role, Young will lay the groundwork for an expanded Book Harvest organization – one that realizes greater reach and impact in its flagship community of Durham and that catalyzes and maximizes its impact, scale, and policy influence beyond Durham.
“We have just celebrated our first decade of successes,” observed Young. “Since Book Harvest launched in 2011, children and families have harvested 1.6 million books to take home and keep, building home libraries. Our portfolio of programs to transform children’s literacy here in Durham starts at birth and reaches deep into our community. As we embark on our second decade, we are ready to work with other communities, and I am thrilled to have this opportunity to be in even greater partnership with system leaders, policy makers, and other passionate childhood literacy advocates across our state and our country.”

*One of the many letters Young has received from grateful children.*

Today, Wood and Young will launch a search for an Executive Director of Book Harvest Durham, which will continue to be part of Book Harvest, Inc., responsible for taking its signature literacy programs to scale in Book Harvest’s flagship community and piloting new program innovations and policy initiatives in Durham (see the full job description at bookharvest.org/careers). At the same time, Young will begin the work to expand the organization’s impact to other communities, a portfolio of initiatives that will include program replication, public policy engagement, and resource development.
“None of this would be possible,” added Young, “without a decade of formidable and robust partnerships in Durham – with community organizations, public and private enterprises, and, most especially, with the children and families whom we continue to serve and honor. We stand in awe of every child’s innate brilliance and boundless potential, and we are committed to unlocking opportunity and ensuring that every child everywhere has what they need to thrive in school and in life.”

About Book Harvest

Book Harvest provides an abundance of books and ongoing literacy support to families and their children from birth and serves as a model for communities committed to ensuring that children are lifelong readers and learners. Since its founding in 2011, Book Harvest has provided more than 1.6 million books to children and a wealth of literacy supports to parents in central North Carolina and beyond. Learn more at www.bookharvest.org.

Book Harvest’s Dream Big Book Drive

February 3, 2020/in Book Harvest/by Jeanna Baxter White

By Jeanna Baxter White

“Everyone needs to become a good reader so that when they are an adult they will have a better life,” said six-year-old Jade Vaughan-Bey during Book Harvest’s Dream Big Book Drive and Community Celebration held on MLK Day at Rhythms Live Music Hall in downtown Durham.

Hearing such wisdom from a young child brought a huge smile to the face of Book Harvest Founder Ginger Young who exclaimed enthusiastically, “Jade gets it – that’s what this program is all about!”

*Jade Vaughan-Bey reads to her mother, Taquoia Street.*

Getting Books to Every Preschooler

“The benefits of a book-rich home environment begin accruing at birth. If we wait until a child starts school, we’ve waited too long,” she explained. “The consequences of raising a child in a bookless home are direct, severe, and lifelong. And there are a lot of kids in our midst who don’t own books.”

Fulfilling the Dream

To combat the problem, and to fulfill her dream that “every child in our community should grow up in the presence of books, and plenty of them,” Young began collecting donated books in her garage. Soon she and a team of volunteers were supplying donated books to children and programs across Durham and Orange counties and Book Harvest was born. As her dream grew, so did the need to collect more books.

“Dream Big began as an experiment to see if we could collect book donations on MLK Day 2012; in our first year, we had several new bookshelves throughout the community that needed books every week, and we were working hard to bring in the donations to keep those shelves of free books for kids stocked. That first event brought in 10,122 books – and we were off to the races!”

Inspired by the Vision of Dr. King

“Today, Book Harvest’s annual Dream Big Book Drive and Community Celebration remains deeply connected to MLK Day, the day on which it has been held for nine years; we are inspired by Dr. King’s vision of a world in which every child has the chance to realize his or her full potential. This annual event is part book drive, part volunteer opportunity, part activity fair, and part fundraiser. But the main goal for the day is to bring the entire community together in celebration of the organization’s big dream: that all kids can grow up in a world in which reading, learning, and access to information are considered rights and not privileges so that all children can thrive.”

Over 1,000 people showed up for Book Harvest’s annual Dream Big Book Drive and Community Celebration. This annual event is part book drive, part volunteer opportunity, part activity fair, and part fundraiser.

Harvesting All Year Long

“Book Harvest is here 365 days a year because books are an evergreen need. We come together once a year for this glorious celebration and hope people will remember us all year long. This is the one day when all of our communities are in the same space: families who are enrolled in Book Babies, families who harvest books from the laundromats and health centers where we stock shelves, families who’ve done book drives for us, local business leaders, elected officials, foundation staffs, and those who care about literacy. Everyone is out here.”

Building Home Libraries

This year’s Dream Big Book Drive and Community Celebrations was another amazing success. A total of 42,183 new and gently used books were collected during the event and throughout the month of January!

“Imagine ALL of the home libraries those books will fill, the bedtime stories they will provide, the pride their new owners will feel when they put them on their bookshelves or bedside tables!” said Book Harvest Communications and Events Manager Daniele Berman. “But that’s not the only inspiring number I’m marveling at today:”

1,113 people packed Rhythms Live Music Hall to volunteer and celebrate with us at Dream Big on MLK Day! (The largest number ever)
74 neighborhoods, schools, workplaces, and organizations ran book drives and collected new and gently used books to donate! (See the huge list here!)
Sponsors donated $116,100 to make Dream Big and Book Harvest‘s work happen year-round! (Check out all our sponsors here — including our first-ever Dream Sponsor, Hendrick Subaru Southpoint! Special thanks to our other top sponsors: Duke University Libraries, Scholastic, Wells Fargo, Mebane Foundation, Written Word Media, and United Way of the Greater Triangle.)

Rock Star Volunteers Support Literacy

An event of this magnitude requires an army of volunteers. Young is forever grateful for the passion and commitment of the volunteers who continue to show up, many of them year after year. This year, the first 200 volunteer slots posted were filled within 43 minutes!

“In addition to being a great big celebration of literacy and books for all kids,” explains Berman, “Dream Big also represents a unique volunteer opportunity. Each year, the event provides a space where parents can volunteer with young children, coworkers can volunteer as a team, service groups can dedicate their efforts, and anyone who wants to is able to find a way to honor Dr. King’s legacy and engage in a meaningful way with our mission.”

Book Harvest’s Legacy is Empowerment

Jade and her mom, Taquoia Street, are two of those passionate volunteers. Young calls them “rockstars of promoting the cause.”

Their involvement with Book Harvest began when Jade was a newborn. “A nurse came to my home and told me about Book Babies. She explained that once every six months, from birth until age five, a Book Harvest representative would deliver age-appropriate books to our house and would share tips about what my daughter should be able to do at each stage of development. As a first-time mom, I didn’t really know, so it sounded wonderful.”

Street soon began attending Book Harvest events and got involved with collecting books for other children. Empowered by the effect the books have had on Jade, who was part of the first graduating class of Book Babies and is now an avid reader, Street has begun sponsoring a summer reading comprehension camp for neighborhood children. “Who knew that getting free books for my child would develop into a passion of my own!”

“It’s been an amazing experience. Now everywhere I go I’m screaming Book Harvest,” she said with a smile. “I’ve adopted their mission of making sure that children of all economic levels have the same opportunities and access to books.”

These Volunteers Share a Passion for Educating Youth

She’s not the only volunteer who feels that way. “I think every kid should grow up in a home with books,” said long-time volunteer Holly Brown who has worked with Book Harvest for the past nine years, including serving as vice-chair of the board, as well as on several committees. “Without books, children can’t reach their full potential. We don’t know who might be the next Marie Curie, or the next Thurgood Marshall, Ida B. Wells, or Albert Einstein.”

*Members of the Triangle Park Chapter of The Links, Inc. have been faithful volunteers for Dream Big since the first year.*

Other dedicated volunteers included members of the Triangle Park Chapter of The Links, Inc., a service organization committed to enriching, sustaining, and ensuring the cultural and economic survival of African-Americans and other persons of African ancestry; this group has been volunteering and providing financial support to Dream Big since year one.

Dozens of volunteers help sort and pack books.

The group’s philanthropic endeavors are divided into five facets, one of which is Service to Youth. This facet focuses on helping youth of African ancestry discover and reach their full potential, explained Bernadine Cobb, Service to Youth co-chair. “We believe in the importance of educating our youth, and Dream Big falls right in line with that. This has been my first year to volunteer and I didn’t know what to expect, but when I walked in I thought ‘Wow! I won’t miss another year!’ ”

The event was equally exciting for first-timer Beatriz Morales who volunteered through her employer, Crescom Bank. She brought along her daughters, Hannah Morales and Valerie Aquirre, to help sort books because she thought Big Dream would be a great opportunity for the family to be involved in the community together.

All agreed they would definitely be back. While sorting, teenaged Hannah was amazed to find a copy of her favorite book while growing up and was thrilled that she would be allowed to keep it, demonstrating the power of a book.

Working Towards the Goal

“Too many kids lack access to books. Yet this is a problem we can fix. And Book Harvest is doing just that,” said Young. “We are fixing it with grit and intentionality, laying a pipeline of books that starts at birth and will, when we realize our big dreams, continue all the way to age 10 and beyond. And we are accompanying parents on their journey, providing them with books, literacy support, and information on brain development so that they can continue to nourish their children’s vast potential. What a joy and a privilege this work is for us!”

Check Out the Fun at the 2020 Dream Big Book Drive!

You Can Help

Book Harvest provides an abundance of books and ongoing literacy support to families and their children from birth and serves as a model for communities committed to ensuring that children are lifelong readers and learners. Their vision is of a world in which reading, learning, and access to information are considered rights, not privileges so that all children thrive. Since its founding in 2011, Book Harvest has provided more than 1.2 million books to children in North Carolina. Learn more by visiting their website.

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