Library patron and voracious reader donates to book kits

Posted on December 15, 2020

By Cathy Shouse

Dee Cramsie has frequented libraries all her life and is in her third year of donating to the IndyPL Book Club in a Bag program. 

Co-founder of a book club, she appreciates the rewards of participation.

Before she passed away last year, Cramsie’s sister, Marilyn, would swap stories with her about books they were reading with their respective book clubs. Cramsie credits their parents for their book obsession. “They appreciated education and they believed reading was a way to become better educated,” she said.

Cramsie, 73, and her three children made Indianapolis their home in the 1980s. After retiring from her work in investing, estate planning,  and trusts, she lived in Raleigh, North Carolina to be with family. She discovered book kits, bags of ten identical books and a discussion guide—ideal for book clubs. Thanks, in part, to Cramsie’s past years of donations, the Library now has 442 kits. Back in Indiana since 2017, Cramsie has now also included the Library Foundation in her will. A special link on the Library website sorts book kits by genre and allows online reservations: bit.ly/indyplbcib

“I’m the type of person that you would see sitting on the floor of the library with a stack of books around me, pre-Covid,” said Cramsie. “I’m a voracious reader.” Whether discussing Louise Penny’s “Still  Life” or Abraham Verghese’s “Cutting for Stone,” books are vital to her life and historical fiction is her favorite.

“I want to praise the Central Library. I am receiving more of a benefit than what I give them,” Cramsie said. “I plan on doubling my gift this year, because I think it’s so important. I love the library.”