Arthiss Kliever
The Little People’s Librarian

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The upstairs area of Arthiss Kliever’s Lake Highlands home is a landscape of sundry colors, bold titles and possibilities spilling forth — bright yellow and red shelves hold rows of children’s books, well-worn and brand-new, picturesque and copy-heavy, fantastic and historical. Eager neighborhood kids pore through pages — there are about 8,000 books to date — trying to decide which are worthy of checking out. The limit is five.

Whatever your child’s interest happens to be at the time (and every parent knows that changes from week to week), Mrs. K will have a book to satisfy, says Tiffany Walker, mother of a 5-year-old and a 17-month-old.

“Reading a book is one of the best gifts you can give a child. Here, it’s free. Mrs. K loves, nurtures and cherishes the children like her own,” Walker says. “I feel like a better mom after a visit to the little library.”

Kliever, known as Mrs. K to droves of young library members, decided to turn her home into Launa’s Little Library after her daughter Launa, a former schoolteacher, moved away and left behind more than 1,000 books.

“I didn’t want to let the books go,” Kliever says, “but I knew I wanted to get them in the hands of kids.”

Though it’s not part of the traditional library system, Launa’s Library is run just as efficiently. Kliever worked 10 years in the Southern Methodist University library, and she’s a stickler for organization right down to the old-school checkout system and card catalog. It’s not easy to keep up, especially as word of the library spreads around Lake Highlands and its popularity grows, but it is well worth the work.

“It combines my favorite things — I’m not an avid reader but I love children’s books. I love the detail work. I love the kids. Every part is fun,” she says.

“I’ve watched kids grow up in the seven years I’ve been doing this. I cherish the interaction with the little patrons, and we just have so many loyal families that I have gotten to know,” she says.

Other neighbors also have contributed to the unconventional library’s success, she says.

For example, over the summer, a group of kids set up a lemonade stand and donated the profits to Launa’s. And the Lake Highlands Exchange Club recently awarded Kliever $1,000 to purchase books.

But no reward could be sufficient for a place so “magical”, Walker says.

“It’s just hard to believe all that [Kliever] has done — she has created a magical place that takes you back to the Wally-Beaver Cleaver days.”

Terry King
The Gift Gatherer

On a frigid morning in December — while many might have been cozying up by the fireplace, sipping morning java — Terry King was making sure that about 300 disadvantaged kids were going to enjoy Christmas.

King heads up a project called Annie’s Kids through Lake Highlands United Methodist Church. That Saturday morning, she worked with fellow church members to distribute Christmas gifts to Lake Highlands families located through elementary school counselors who gave King names of families unable to afford to buy presents for their children. Church members adopt those families and fill their wish lists.

“It works like the Angel Tree that they have at NorthPark every Christmas,” King says. “The parents, mostly, are very grateful. Sometimes they try to explain why they can’t afford the gifts — like by writing ‘out of work’ on the wish list, for example.”

“The project requires a lot of work on her part,” says Don Lee, a member of the church and the Lake Highlands Exchange Club.

“It isn’t just me. It’s a whole team of folks,” King says.

The congregation and organizations such as the Exchange Club are always generous, she says. King has no children and says maybe that’s meant to be.

“I think this might just be what I’m supposed to be doing instead,” she says.

Her work isn’t entirely focused on the holiday season, either. While she was working with the school counselors, she asked about immediate needs. Staffers at Skyview Elementary told her some students desperately needed uniforms.

“Some parents couldn’t buy one pair of pants, much less two so they could alternate clothes day by day. They needed socks, underwear and basics, so we rounded up the money to buy them the things they needed,” King says.

“Don (and the Exchange Club) came through with a donation for the uniforms. The counselors from Skyview were wonderful to work with. I am just a facilitator.”  
 

Darrell Wood
The Cleaner Upper
 
Barring a blizzard or a rainstorm, Darrell Wood can be spotted every morning purposefully walking the streets of his White Rock Lake area neighborhood.

“If you drive along Easton in the morning — every morning — you’ll see him picking up trash in the median for blocks and blocks. Keeping this neighborhood garbage-free seems to be his goal,” says Reba Liner, who works at Central Lutheran Church on Easton, which is on Wood’s daily route.

Trash removal isn’t Wood’s sole goal — he’s also on the lookout for crime and suspicious behavior.

“When I’m out there, I have my cell phone with me, and I’m actually doing my neighborhood crime patrol on foot,” Wood says.

Once, he says, he caught two guys breaking into a storage building.

“Picking up trash is a good cover for crime patrol,” he says with a smile.

Since moving to the area in 1973, Woods has served on the neighborhood crime watch and his homeowners association board (he was president in 2006-2007). He’s a member of the Garland Road Vision committee and the Dallas Crime Watch executive board. He rallies neighbors to become involved, and he helps train others for volunteer organizations such as Citizens Helping in Parking Solutions (CHIPS) and the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT).

Wood’s extraordinary involvement is rooted in a desire to keep the neighborhood where he and wife Kay live “safe and sound,” he says. Recently he saw the fruits of one of his endeavors come to fruition at the dedication of a playground in the Dixon Branch area.

“I went to a lot of meetings, worked closely with our city councilman and [other neighborhood associations] … and worked to get funding,” he says.

The father of four and grandfather of 12 credits the neighborhoods’ collaborative effort with making the state-of-the-art playground a reality.

“We have a very active community and a lot of really good people.”