July 14, 2025
The bookstore will remodel right into a public archive and group hub.
The oldest Black-owned bookstore in Kansas Metropolis, Missouri, will shut its present chapter, however its mission to advertise Black literacy will stay alive.
Willa’s Books and Vinyl opened its first brick-and-mortar retailer in 2007, however its proprietor, Willa Robinson, had been sharing tales with the Black group because the Nineties. Robinson sought out uncommon and vintage books by Black authors, introducing them to native numerous youth and provoking a love of studying.
She says this mission saved her storied bookstore round for many years. Since then, she has grown her assortment to over 20,000 books.
“You by no means noticed Black children in books,” Robinson stated to the Kansas Metropolis Star. “I’ve been accumulating books for years, since 1978, and only a few of the books had Black kids in it.”
In response to Robinson, encouraging Black boys to learn required having tales they felt seen in. For the bibliophile, that meant ditching the classics and prioritizing works by Black authors.
“It’s important to have books that youngsters are enthusiastic about,” Robinson informed the outlet. “As a result of as a younger lady, I didn’t learn the classics … and I believe younger Black boys don’t establish with them as a result of it’s not about them.”
Nevertheless, age caught as much as the long-time entrepreneur. The 84-year-old determined to shut up store on the request of her family members. She hosted a retirement social gathering July 12 to have a good time her timeless work in the neighborhood, marking a bittersweet finish to the bookshop.
Regardless of her retirement, the previous bookstore will stay devoted to Black youth literacy. Robinson has partnered with the Kansas Metropolis Defender, an area Black digital information outlet, to proceed its legacy. Robinson will grant possession of her paintings, titles, and different archival gadgets to the Defender.
The Defender will take over the bookstore, making certain it turns into a communal hub and public archive of those works. Members of the group can go to and skim the books without cost, which embrace first-edition novels by Black authors resembling Frederick Douglass, Langston Hughes, and Richard Wright.
With the bookstore as its new headquarters, the Defender may even host its B-REAL Academy (Black Radical Schooling for Abolition and Liberation) to have interaction the group on Black historical past and radicalism. The huge efforts will additionally hold Black tales and teachings inside Missouri, as many state colleges confronted ebook bans and cuts to DEI initiatives.
“After we discuss concerning the erasure that’s at present occurring with Black schooling, of Black books, there’s simply no higher place to intervene than the oldest and longest-standing Black bookstore within the state,” defined Defender Founder and Government Editor Ryan Sorrell.
The Defender goals to proceed Robinson’s legacy by way of this effort, with a fundraiser within the works to assist with renovations.
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