If you ask any child less than four feet tall if they know who “Mr. Terry” is, you may get a resounding and enthusiastic, “yes!” 

“Mr. Terry,” or Terry Rollins, is something of a celebrity among Washington and Beaufort County children. For the last fourteen years at George H. and Laura E. Brown Library, he has shown thousands of children the fun and joy of reading. 

“Mr. Terry,” Rollins’ described, is a persona similar to famous television host Mister Fred Rogers. It was born out of the pandemic when Brown Library had to plan programs that could be done virtually. Known as “Mr. Terry’s Story Time,” Rollins would record himself reading children’s books then upload them to the library’s Facebook page. The videos gained a following inside and outside of Beaufort County. 

“I love that and I love being Mr. Terry,” Rollins said. “I love walking through Food Lion or Walmart or walking down Main Street and kids are like, ‘Mister Terry!’ I just love that, because that shows how much they love the library. They connect me with the library as they should. It just shows how excited they are about the programming of the library.” 

Rollins is a North Carolina native hailing from Fuquay-Varina. Since receiving a degree in Library Sciences from Wake Technical Community College in the 1970s, he has spent a total 45 years working at libraries, academic, residential and public, as well as bookstores across the state.

He started as an assistant librarian at the School for the Blind in Raleigh which is a residential school for visually impaired children. The library had books for kindergarteners to high school seniors. From there, he worked at Chapel Hill Public Library and Wilson Public Library in the children’s departments. 

Rollins’ goal and mission as a children’s librarian has always been to “instill in children a lifelong love of reading and libraries and books.” 

“It’s really awesome that you get children coming to toddler story time. You can get infants coming in for the first time. From there, you just build upon that and again, here in a small town library, I’ve really been able to watch children grow up and become teens users and even adult library users,” Rollins said. 

What Rollins loves about small town libraries is that everyone who works there “gets to do a little bit of everything.” 

“In a small town library like Brown, you get to wear all different hats,” he said. This can look like working the circulation desk, helping patrons with research, plan programs or do community outreach at festivals. “And of course children’s librarians get to be the clowns and dress up and have fun.”  

Rollins began working at Brown Library in October of 2010. The holiday season that year gave him a slow start; however, the spring and summer ushered in a myriad of tiny patrons. 

“It seemed a little slow at first compared to Wilson Public Library which was a very busy library. I was astounded come summer of the following year when we kicked off the summer library program and hundreds and hundreds of children came to the library,” Rollins said. “The families of Washington support this library so wonderfully. That was just an amazing experience.” 

Every summer thereafter, children’s attendance at the library “exploded,” he described. 

Understanding that “children are these remarkable bursts of life,” and putting yourself on a child’s level are just two things great children’s librarians do, Rollins believes. 

“This is a wonderful person here; a little person being formed right there in front of us. Whatever they say is valuable, we never put them down but always honor and appreciate all of them,” Rollins said.  

Rollins is not just popular with local children. He is also popular among their adult relatives who go on his ghost walks known as Washington Haunts. Started in the early 2000s, Washington Haunts gives Rollins an opportunity to share his love of history and storytelling with participants. 

“Whether a person believes in ghosts or not – I feel like I am sharing about this person’s experience whether they are a ghost or it’s just the story of their life, I am given the opportunity to tell others about that person’s life,” Rollins said. He believes this “engages” people and their reactions to the stories.

He “definitely” plans to continue Washington Haunts during his retirement. 

Storytelling has been a “tremendous” part of Rollins’ life. He is a co-founder and past president of the North Carolina Storytelling Guild. 

“I feel that being a storyteller has helped me immensely as a children’s librarian, because I’m not restricted to just reading the book. I try to bring the book to life for kids, doing that through storytelling,” Rollins said. 

Rollins brought storytelling to life in two major ways at Brown Library, Harry Potter Halloween and royal tea parties. 

Harry Potter Halloween is an award-winning program that invites children to Brown Library to experience and explore the wizarding world of Harry Potter. Life-size decorations and library employees in costumes earned Rollins and Brown Library the Best Programming award for a small library from the North Carolina Public Library Directors Association in 2021. 

At the royal tea parties, children donned their best dresses and suits for an afternoon of story time complete with singing and snacks. The themes ranged from pirates and mermaids, to winter snowflakes and baby animals. 

Rollins also has strengthened the children’s department in terms of how many books have been added and the diverse range of topics the nonfiction books cover. “I am very proud of our nonfiction collection, because I have parents come in who are helping their kids do research and they’re like, ‘this is fantastic. I didn’t think I’d find a book on this subject, but here it is.’ So, I do take pride in that.” 

To no one’s surprise, Rollins loved to read as a child. His favorite books were “Call of the Wild” by Jack London and “Charlotte’s Web” by E. B. White.

“Those two books just really solidified how much I loved reading when I was a kid,” Rollins said. “They are great books and kids still check them out. I love it.”