True Hero

By

The poorer areas of Bogota, Colombia have limited access to books, due to not being close-by to any of the city’s libraries. José Gutierrez, a 53-year-old garbage collector, began rescuing thrown-away books 20 years ago, creating a makeshift library for the community in his house. He is now known as “Lord of the Books,” and the collection has over 20,000 books.


Katie O'Brien is an English major at Cornell University, where she writes for kitsch magazine, DJs for a rock station, and complains about the cold. Find her on Twitter @abluekite. More from this author →