UC Books to Prisoners was started early in 2004 by Radym Berlinger Reitman, a Graduate School of Library Science student, when he accepted a small box of letters from Midwest Pages to Prisoners, an Indiana books to prisoners group, and began collecting books from the community and mailing them to incarcerated peopple. At that time, our book inventory was housed on a shelf at the original Urbana Champaign Independent Media Center location, a 900 square foot office space on Main Street in Urbana.

As more volunteers became involved and book donation channels were established, including the bin at Strawberry Fields grocery and deli in Urbana, the book collection began to outgrow the space available in the IMC and the operation moved a few blocks away to the Illinois Disciples Foundation, on Springfield Ave. In November of 2004, BTP held its first book sale in the parking lot of the Illinois Disciples Foundation and a second book sale followed in the spring of 2005. In addition to raising funds, it also reduced our book inventory in anticipation of our next move into what is our current space at 202 S. Broadway Ave in Urbana.

By the end of April 2005, the Independent Media Center had completed the purchase of the historical 30,000 square ft. Urbana Post Office building. A room in the basement with built-in shelving was allocated for books to prisoners and we moved our entire inventory, which at that time was several thousand of books, into this space. For a time our books were shelved laying flat until the shelving was modified.