ERIE, Pa. (AP) — Madison Phelps came home from preschool on a sunny afternoon last week and saw a pile of mail sitting on a table.
The 4-year-old spotted a book, "Caterina and the Lemonade Stand," encased in clear plastic that had her name printed on the label.
She tore through the plastic, like a child making mincemeat out of gift wrappings on Christmas Day, and flipped through the book for a minute or so before Madison brought it to her mom.
Amber Phelps and her daughter then plopped down on the living room floor and read the story of the entrepreneurial brown bird. Madison sat quietly while her mother read, and she asked a handful of questions throughout the story.
Phelps, a 30-year-old single mother of two who works nights as a cook at an Erie tavern, enrolled both Madison and younger daughter Abigail, 2, in the United Way of Erie County's Imagination Library shortly after each child was born.
The family has accumulated close to 50 books since they started participating in the nonprofit's hugely successful free literacy program, with the Imagination Library items having their own spot in Madison and Abigail's playroom bookshelf.
"The books really mean a lot to us. It helps a great deal," said Phelps, acknowledging the struggles of her low-income household. "We love our reading time together, and I love seeing how much the girls are picking up."
The Imagination Library ensures kids will have access to quality books, regardless of income.
Before Dolly Parton became one of the biggest names in country music history, she was one of 12 children growing up poor in Tennessee with a father who couldn't read or write.
Parton in 1997 started the Imagination Library to ensure that children would have access to quality books, regardless of income. The initiative currently provides free books in about 2,000 communities to more than 750,000 children worldwide.
The local United Way launched the program here in July 2013, and it has enrolled more than 12,300 children younger than the age of 5 — nearly 73 percent of the 17,000 children in Erie County.
The number of participants is double the benchmark estimates United Way officials were given by the Dollywood Foundation — the organizational body that oversees the Imagination Library — when the Erie-based agency, 420 W. Sixth St., started the project here.
The local project reached a major milestone this month, mailing out its 200,000th book, which is nearly triple the benchmark estimates set by the Dollywood Foundation.
"We are shocked that it has done this well so fast," said Laurie Root, senior vice president of resource development for the local United Way. "The community has really embraced it. We hit an area where there was a real need, a real gap."
Organizers of the project say it typically takes five years to have 10,000 children signed up, a feat Erie County's Imagination Library pulled off in about two years.
The books, mailed once a month to a child's home in his or her name, are available to any households in the county until the child turns 5.
United Way, a key player in the region's battle against poverty, has targeted outreach for the library in neighborhoods with high pockets of poor residents.
The program has garnered the attention and financial support of several major sponsors, with the Erie Community Foundation, Country Fair, UPMC Health Plan, Erie Insurance and PNC Bank helping back the literacy initiative with several hundred thousand dollars.
The local United Way also uses about $275,000 of its fundraising annually to pay for the books, mailing fees -- the items are shipped from the Dollywood Foundation in Tennessee, marketing, and other Imagination Library-related events or activities, Root said.
"People instinctively know how important reading to their children is to being successful in school and life afterward," Root said. "It's one of the most simple and easy things to do. Ten to 15 minutes a day is all it takes to make a huge difference in a child's life."
Aaron and Heather Kleps, of Millcreek Township, work as a physician assistant and schoolteacher, respectively.
Their fields, health and education, connect directly to literacy and made signing their daughter, Madelynn, 2, up for the Imagination Library a no-brainer, Aaron Kleps said.
"There's been a big push for early childhood reading, which the importance of cannot be stated enough," Aaron Kleps, 27, said. "My wife is due in January with our second child. We'll be signing him up (in the Imagination Library) right away."
Stephanie King, director of early care and education for Early Connections, a center for youths from low-income families, said she's seeing more of her preschoolers bringing their Imagination Library books to school to share with teachers and friends.
"They are so excited to tell us when a new book comes to their house, and even more excited when their teachers read it to their class," King said. "Early literacy is so important in a child's brain development. The books they read foster their sense of wonder about the world."