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November 18, 2009

Teen donates 25,000 books to Trenton library

nj.com

By Carmen Cusido
November 16, 2009, 6:41PM

TRENTON — It all started with 17-year-old Lindsey Curewitz wanting to clean her room and get rid of some books.

The avid reader, who has read Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” four times, culled about 100 books from her shelves.

But she didn’t stop there.

Soon the Yardley teen had embarked on a summer campaign to collect about 10,000 books and donate them to the Trenton Free Public Library.

Curewitz called her collection effort “Books Going Places,” and accepted donations from individuals, friends, day camps, doctors’ offices, the Trenton Thunder and area corporations.

By the time she was done, she had amassed 25,000 titles, including books on tape, DVDs, young adult fiction and non-fiction and children’s books.

“Reading is a way to expand your horizon,” said Curewitz, a Pennsbury High School senior. “I saw that they had a need here, and I had all these books.”

Curewitz was honored Monday by library officials and Mayor Douglas Palmer, who presented the teen with a certificate for outstanding community service at Trenton’s library headquarters branch on Academy Street.

“I am shocked at the number she was able to get,” said Susan Sternberg, the assistant director of the Trenton Free Public Library. “It really speaks to her organizational ability.”
The previous largest donation of books the library received was 300, Sternberg said.

Some of the books will be sent to the library system’s five branches. Others, including art books worth hundreds of dollars, will be sold through Amazon.com, as part of a fundraising effort. Some will be sold to the public at the Friends of the Trenton Free Public Library Dec. 10 and 11. Sternberg said the money raised from the book sale will go into the Friends’ treasury, and they and the library administration will determine how it’ll be spent.

Sternberg said any remaining books will find a home within the state’s prison system, in particular Trenton State Prison.

“Lindsey just wanted to be assured that the books wouldn’t be in the trash,” Sternberg said. “We will definitely find a home for them.”

The teen began collecting books in June and finished in late September.

On Monday, her younger brother Max Curewitz, 15, who helped count the books and pack them in boxes, said he is proud of his sister. And Lindsey’s parents, Barry and Melissa, say their daughter has always loved to read. “We couldn’t pass a Barnes & Noble, even on vacation, without having to go in,” Melissa Curewitz said.

Lindsey Curewitz’s community service efforts don’t end with the library. She is a volunteer for various organizations, including the Jewish Community Youth Foundation, a philanthropy program for teens in grades 8-12, through the United Jewish Federation of Princeton Mercer Bucks. She is on JCYF’s advisory board, and helps decide where to allocate money she and other teens collect.

She also spent two weeks this summer in New Orleans as a member of the Mitzvah Corps., the teen service arm of the Union of Reform Judaism, to help rebuild a community school.

Curewitz is planning to study international law, and is applying to several colleges, including Harvard, Yale, Tulane, Brandeis and the University of Pittsburgh.

Posted by tumulty at November 18, 2009 2:20 PM

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