COLUMBIANA COUNTY Drive for reading

By NORMAN LEIGH
VINDICATOR SALEM BUREAU
HE QUAINT COUNTRY LIB-rary where a friendly librarian knows everyone's name and always has time to chat still exists in Columbiana County.
Instead of a roof and a permanent address, though, it has four wheels, an engine and delivers its literary freight directly to its patrons.
Meet the Lepper Library's bookmobile, a roving ambassador for reading.
Toby Kupka is the bookmobile's librarian, a position she's had for about eight years. The grandmotherly Kupka calls her post the best job she's ever had.
Part of her fondness for the work is her love for books, reading and travel. But it's mostly the people that keep her climbing aboard.
Although they come for books, "They're here to talk, too," Kupka said of the dozens of patrons she often refers to as her regulars.
"Sometimes at Christmas, people bring cookies," Kupka said. "We talk about books. About grandkids. It's a good time."
Big fans
At 86, Elizabeth Trough of Hanoverton said she doesn't know what she would do without the bookmobile's regular stops.
"It means everything to me," said Trough, who noted she doesn't drive. "It helps me spend hours reading that I would otherwise have to look into space," she added.
"We would be lost without this book truck," said Margaret Morrow, also of Hanoverton.
The white, green-trimmed 1991 bookmobile has about 74,000 miles on the odometer.
The vehicle, which carries about 4,500 books, motors nearly 6,000 miles per year, many over the county's narrow, hilly lanes.
At the helm is Charlie Buckley, a former truck driver, who also enjoys his unusual job.
"There's a lot of lawyers and doctors, but I'm the only bookmobile driver in the county," Buckley quipped.
The list of stops constitutes a roster of some of the county's smallest, most far-flung communities, including Winona, Negley, Rogers, Kensington and Damascus.
The hamlets -- with their tiny groceries, ice cream stands, war memorials and playgrounds -- offer up a thick slice of apple-pie Americana where people still wave at strangers.
Other stops include small schools, a women's jail, workshops for people who are disabled and a facility for troubled boys.
Goal of bookmobile
The bookmobile's aim is to bring the library to those who might not be able to get to a bricks-and-mortar institution, or who simply like the convenience of having the library come to them.
"I don't have to go to Lisbon; I just walk out, and here it is," said Dr. Bruce Marhefka, a Winona veterinarian who had just emerged from the bookmobile with Jack Higgins and Tom Clancy thrillers clamped beneath his arm.
"It's a beautiful service," said Bonnie McDevitt of Winona.
Service is a priority for Kupka. Tacked to the bulletin board near her small desk at the rear of the bookmobile are titles clipped from magazines. Patrons have brought them in asking if she can find the books and bring them with her on the next stop. Kupka usually succeeds.
She prides herself in knowing many of her regulars' reading tastes and ensuring she always has something on board for them.
"Some of my regulars tell me, 'Just pick out some books for me,'" Kupka related.
That kind of attention means a lot.
"Once we get a patron, we usually keep them," Kupka said. "It's like a family."
leigh@vindy.com