GREENFIELD — When 4-year-old Noah McConahay saw his likeness in a bronze statue unveiled in downtown Greenfield this week, he couldn’t help but grin.
The young boy and his mother, Kelsey McConahay, are among the three people featured in the Imagination Library statue dedicated Oct. 17 outside the Hancock County Annex, just southeast of the county courthouse.
A life-sized statue of the mother and son appear on one end of a black iron bench while a little girl named Kayla Ball is featured on the opposite end.
They represent the span of the Imagination Library program, which gifts a new book to children every month from birth through five years old.
Seven-year-old Kayla and the McConahays were photographed two years ago for the statue, which is a gift to the community from the Community Foundation of Hancock County, which initiated the program in Hancock County in 2015.
The childhood literacy program was launched by the Dollywood Foundation in 1995, thanks to the vision and generosity of legendary performer Dolly Parton.
It delivers a new, age-appropriate book to the home of each enrolled child on a monthly basis — from birth through age 5 — with the hopes of boosting literacy skills and instilling a love of reading.
“That’s a volume of 60 books,” said Greenfield’s mayor, Chuck Fewell, who read a proclamation at Tuesday’s unveiling.
He and Kayla held a 3-foot-long pair of scissors to cut a green ribbon to officially welcome the sculpture, which was created by sculptor Susie Chisholm of Savannah, Ga.
Chisholm and her husband, Billy, picked up the two-piece statue at a foundry in Atlanta and drove it to Greenfield on Sunday, Oct. 15, helping to put it into place the following day.
Four-year-old Noah was slightly panicked watching videos of his plastic-wrapped likeness being lowered into place by a crane.
“He was asking all day when we were going to get out of the plastic,” said his mom with a grin.
McConahay said it has been a thrill receiving books to read to her son every month since the day he was born.
Kayla’s mother, Kendra Ball of Greenfield, credits the Imagination Library program for instilling a love of reading in her daughter.
“Many of the books were mailed during COVID, and she would get so excited to get a book in the mail,” the mom recalled.
“The program starts off sending board books when they’re babies, then advance into other books. Her favorite was Baby Signs, which taught her some sign language and early communication skills,” said Ball, who thinks the ongoing exposure to books helped advance Kayla’s reading ability.
“The whole program has been amazing. It’s a great opportunity for all kinds in Hancock County,” she said.
Mary Gibble, the community foundation’s president and CEO, took the opportunity at the statue unveiling to thank donors who made the local Imagination Program possible.
An dedicated endowment fund was established and has grown upward of $2 million, which will now fully fund the Hancock County program in the future.
“Today an average of 2,500 children representing every Hancock County zip code benefit from this incredible program, and over 1,700 children have graduated from the program,” said Gibble. “This feat could not be accomplished without our partnership with the Hancock County Public Library, whose staff processes enrollments, tracks address changes, and provides related monthly reports,” she said.
Gibble also commended city and county officials for their support in placing the new bronze statue on the northwest corner of the annex, at 111 American Legion Place.
The location is along the future Riley Trail, which will feature art and literary stops on a path winding through downtown Greenfield. Construction is slated to start next year.
Chisholm — whose sculptures can be found across the country, including Purdue University — said it is an honor for her latest work to be featured on Greenfield’s future cultural trail.
“This (Imagination Library statue) is the first one I’ve ever done in color,” said the artist, referring to the pops of color like Noah’s blue glasses and Kayla’s pink skirt.
“I’m really happy with how it turned out. I think people will be doing double takes,” she said.
To see more of Chisholm’s work, visit Susie Chisholm.com.
For more information on the Imagination Library program, visit CelebrateHancock.org/students/imagination-library.
