It delighted them greatly to see me reading each volume cover to cover. And it paid off later on in school. At the time, the Portland, Oregon area had a College Bowl style show for high school students, I became captain of the team, and we beat three other schools to make it into the "Tournament of Champions".
One of them was a Catholic high school in Portland, and any guilt my folks had about taking me out of Catholic schools to move to southwestern Washington sort of melted away that evening!
I also spent many hours poring over the annual "World Almanac of Facts" which was much more within the reach of my childhood budget (as was "Farmer's Almanac" and "Guiness Book of Records" which were annual purchases in our household).
Even to this day, I recall much of the information I read as a kid. Recently, I blew away my teenage son as he mentioned about studying the U.S. Revolution in school and I gave him detailed explanation of the Townsend Acts and the Stamp Act off the top of my head and how they combined to spark the revolution.
Even to this day, I still Google up subjects that grab my interest. Just yesterday, I was reading articles on border collies because I happened to run into one when walking my dog yesterday morning.
I guess that kind of curiosity is what makes us Freepers.