Freedom to Read Foundation Celebrates 2022 Roll of Honor Recipient Eldon Ray James

Freedom to Read Foundation Celebrates 2022 Roll of Honor Recipient Eldon Ray James

For Eldon Ray James, the 2022 recipient of the Freedom to Read Foundation’s Roll of Honor award, an impromptu declaration of a career goal was a prompt that not only changed his life but also led to a life of service that achieved abundant changes that are preserving intellectual freedom and access to information for library users in many schools, libraries, and institutions across the United States.  

In 1996 Ray was sentenced to 70 months in a minimum security Federal correctional camp where there was an informal library and very little else available to those who were incarcerated there and who wanted to read to improve their lives. Ray asked the corrections officials if the camp could offer Ray and the other inmates college courses, and soon the camp began offering higher education courses through Howard College in Big Spring Texas. 

When asked during an online speech class what he would do when released, Ray stood up and said, “I’m going to become a librarian.” Though his classmates laughed, Ray persevered and was able to complete his bachelor's degree in English and begin coursework at the University of Texas’ School of Information Science with Loriene Roy, who served as President of the American Library Association.  Roy invited Ray to Washington D.C. for her inauguration and to meet with members of the Association of Specialized Government, and Cooperative Library Agencies’ forum for Library Services to the Incarcerated and Detained. Ray volunteered to chair the forum, beginning his years of service within ALA.

In 2009 Ray was invited to revise and update ALA’s “Prisoners Right to Read” document for adoption by the ALA Council, launching his work advocating for the intellectual freedom rights of persons involved in the justice system and those incarcerated behind prison walls. 

“Intellectual freedom is the absolute right to read, write, and think, unrestricted by government at any level,” said James. “An individual has the right to follow their own course through life without interference from institutions of government.” 

“I recognized early on that I could not go back behind bars, but I can help improve conditions for access to information to those who are behind bars,” said James. And that is precisely what he has done.

Ray’s years of service include many hours of work on behalf of the Intellectual Freedom Round Table as well as work on behalf of the Freedom to Read Foundation.  Elected a trustee of the foundation, Ray stepped down after one term because he believed that the Foundation needed the input of librarians and intellectual freedom advocates who represented traditionally marginalized communities.  

Even as his service to FTRF concludes, Ray continues his advocacy on behalf of incarcerated persons’ intellectual freedom as the United States’ representative to the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) Task Force that is working to establish international standards for prison libraries. 

All during his years of service, Ray worked full-time as an information scientist and researcher for a private concern until his retirement in 2019.

Ray will be honored Friday June 24 at the Opening General Session of the 2022 ALA Annual Meeting and that evening at the Freedom to Read Celebration honoring Ray and other intellectual freedom award recipients.