A story worth starting

Long before Kaylee Cusack built a career around storytelling, she was a farm kid in rural Grand Forks County who loved to read.

Cusack, Minnkota Power Cooperative’s senior communications strategist, grew up outside of Larimore, North Dakota, considerably younger than her two sisters and with plenty of time to herself. Reading became both an escape and a constant companion.

“We didn’t have a lot of things, but we did have a lot of books,” she recalled.

Some of her most meaningful memories, however, are not of what she read, but who read with her. Her dad, a multigenerational farmer she describes as stoic, found a way to connect with his young daughter through bedtime stories. Whether he had just come in from the field or finished chores with the cattle, he made time to sit down with her.

“That was his way of connecting with me,” Cusack said. “I think that bonding experience with my dad was really the start of me loving reading and loving the process of storytelling.”

That early connection eventually helped lead her into journalism, communications and a career built around writing. Years later, it would also become the driving force behind her effort to bring Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library to Grand Forks County.

“How do I make this happen?”

Working in the electric cooperative industry, Cusack regularly saw stories about cooperatives supporting Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, an early childhood literacy program that mails free, age-appropriate books to enrolled children from birth until age 5.

The cooperative connection caught her eye.

“I knew that our region did not have Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library,” Cusack said. “And I thought to myself, maybe this is something that I could step up and take the lead on.”

In spring 2025, Cusack began contacting Imagination Library representatives to learn what it would take to start the program locally. Minnkota leadership encouraged the idea, offering meeting space, printing assistance and early financial support. Cusack then began reaching out to community leaders, businesses and service organizations to see whether others would get behind it.

They did.

People shared stories about their own children receiving Imagination Library books in other communities. Even those who couldn’t provide financial support often became advocates.

By summer, Cusack had teamed up with the Community Foundation of Grand Forks, East Grand Forks and Region. The organization became the official local affiliate and helped turn the idea into a communitywide initiative.

“The program is here because of Kaylee,” said Becca Baumbach, president and CEO of the Community Foundation. “She brought the idea to us, she made the case to our staff and board of directors, and she has done the unglamorous work ever since. Registrations, partner outreach, event logistics, all of it as a volunteer. Good ideas usually stall somewhere between the pitch and the operating budget. Kaylee is the reason this one didn’t.”

That success became official July 1, when Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library launched in Grand Forks County. A community celebration followed Aug. 11.

The group ultimately raised $90,000 to get the program started, which is enough to support its first two years of operation as enrollments ramp up to the anticipated 65% coverage of eligible recipients. The long-term goal is to serve as many as 3,000 Grand Forks County children, requiring continued fundraising and community support.

“We enrolled over 900 children in the first six weeks, which tells you the need is real,” Baumbach said. “That happened because a group of partners, Minnkota among them, decided this was worth funding for the long haul.”

Keeping the pages turning

Cusack now serves as the Community Foundation’s volunteer Imagination Library coordinator. She leads committees, helps with fundraising and community outreach, assists families with registrations and account changes, and works to build long-term financial support for the program.

For Cusack, the early response can still be difficult to comprehend.

“I just can’t stop thinking about all the kids – especially the farm kids out there – that are going to get a book in the mail now every month until they turn five,” she said. “That makes me so incredibly happy and so incredibly proud.”

For someone whose own life was shaped by evenings spent reading with her dad, there are some clear parallels. The stories that meant so much to one little girl in rural Grand Forks County are now opening that same door for a new generation.

“I think just the compassion and empathy that I was able to get out of those initial stories kind of carried throughout my entire life,” Cusack said. “The importance of books to me when I was younger, I want other kids, especially rural farm kids, to have that same opportunity surrounded by books.”

MAIN IMAGE: Kaylee Cusack speaks during the launch of Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library at the Grand Forks Public Library, celebrating a new effort to provide free books to young children throughout Grand Forks County. (Minnkota/Michael Hoeft)