Initially, Steiner “firmly believed that it is wrong to seek recognition for oneself.”
She would have been right if she weren’t the generous and loving woman that she is.
“I have done work pairing the private sector with our school using real life letter writing projects to show the students the marketing power of writing and the importance of words,” Steiner told the Variety through email.
Their letters resulted in the donation of athletic equipment for seventh graders, 3,000 books for the school library, and food for the hungry. The donors were Nike, Pepsi and Hormel.
“One company head reached me by phone and told me he receives letters from school children every day, but never in his life had he read such powerful letters. The letters from our 7th graders sparked such a note in his heart that he felt he had to do something big for Rota,” Steiner said.
She wrote a similar letter herself.
“During my morning walk one day last year I looked out over the vast sea and said aloud, ‘Bring me a bookstore!’ I really, really wanted books for Rota.”
So she wrote to a magazine on the mainland called MaryJane’sFarm.
The magazine learned about the lack of books on Rota and its typhoon-shredded library, and decided to do a major article about the island: a full color, two-page spread, which was followed up by a second article.
These articles on Rota sparked a surge of generosity from all over the states and for months now Steiner and her husband have been hauling thousands and thousands of donated books to their little house.
“We can’t really move around in our home anymore — there is no more space — and yet the books keep coming,” Steiner said.
“When this community opened its heart to me I knew I had to do something to return the favor. Which is why I have 10,000 books sitting in the center of my house right now,” she added.
Steiner wants to open a non-profit bookstore on Rota which she plans to name “Two Sisters Bookstore” after the two sisters on Rota who she said saved her life.
“I wish everyone knew about Rota. Rota is the most amazing place in the world, and full of some of the finest people I have ever known,” Steiner said.
Now all that is needed to make her dream a reality are space for the bookstore and the manpower that will construct it.
