One for the books
Apology note to library over torn page goes viral and turns honest boy into a sensation
For the past few evenings, Alison Dowler’s nightly ritual of tucking in 8-year-old Jackson has come with a twist.
Rather than searching for monsters lurking under his bunk as some parents would, Alison started scouring for books.
That’s because Jackson caught plenty of attention this week when a note he wrote to his library branch apologizing for ripping a page from a borrowed Asterix book went viral.
There was no last name on the letter scrawled in blue marker and left in the Toronto Public Library’s Main Street branch on Friday. It read: “I am sorry that a page ripped when it fell out of my bunk when I fell asleep reading. It won’t happen again. I’m sorry, from Jackson.”
The note and the search for Jackson made headlines in the Star and as far away as the U.S. and Europe, but Jackson was too busy with summer camp to notice. His parents only realized who the world was searching for when a neighbour stopped by this week to ask about the news reports.
“Telling the librarian what happened is a good thing instead of what other people do when they hand it in and don’t say anything.”
JACKSON DOWLER
“It was kind of crazy, but cool at the same time,” said Alison, who rushed to a computer to search for the story.
Jackson, who had been busy outside playing, said his reaction to the news was, “Oh, my Goddddd!”
He told the Star he concocted the plan to write the letter with his mother’s permission after he “woke up to the page being ripped and she was mad.” (Alison chimed in to say she was “more upset than mad.”)
“Jackson was worried that the other kids wouldn’t be able to read it,” so Alison said she wanted to use the mishap as a chance to teach Jackson and his siblings a lesson.
That lesson, said Jackson, is that “telling the librarian what happened is a good thing, instead of what other people do when they hand it in and don’t say anything.”
“He was honest about his mistake and he owned up to it and that’s important because honesty is the best policy,” branch manager Daniel Colangelo told the Star. “That is the take home message.”
It was a message Jackson wanted to make sure everyone knew, even this Star reporter, who confided in the boy that as a child she accidentally dropped a library book in a toilet and was forced to ’fess up.
He told her that if she had written an apology note, she, too, “might have got famous.”
When Jackson arrived at the library Wednesday afternoon with his mom, grandmother, 2-year-old brother Bobby and 7-year-old sister Charlie in tow, he was shocked to find a throng of reporters and photographers anxiously awaiting his arrival.
“You got your 15 minutes of fame early. I’m still waiting for mine,” said a joking member of the library staff who greeted Jackson.
“You’re getting it now because you’re meeting me,” the boy said, teasing with a toothy grin.
In the children’s section, instead of handing Jackson a fine, city librarian Vickery Bowles handed him a gift basket and admitted that she often falls asleep reading, too.
Then she left Jackson to roam the library aisles. He made a beeline for the Asterix shelf, promising he would return all the pages intact.
As for the letter, library staff said they plan to hang it on the branch’s wall.