HISTORY OF A BOOKSELLER

Gary: As a boy, I discovered it was possible to own books, to amass a personal library. My mother read voraciously but she did not buy books. I found a used book store in Syracuse, the Economy Bookshop on Salina Street. The Economy was a four-story business that sold new books on the first floor, stationary on the second floor, notions and custom wedding invitations and things like that on the top floor, and in the basement they had a used bookshop. Over the years that I frequented it, I watched it diminish, as the pulp magazine area took over more and more of the used book shelves, until eventually there was very little left.

I would find books in our attic, that had belonged to my great uncles who were long deceased, and I would take these down to Economy Bookshop and I would sell them. They would give me trade slips, heavily inflated over what they would pay in cash. I used those slips to start to collect books. I didn't realize at the moment but it was life changing event. The rare book man at Economy was a Brit, Jack Shoebridge. He really loved old books. He ran the used & rare book department in that basement.

Times changed, "downtown" became a victim of mall sprawl and The Economy went out of business.

Tom: So you were already into book dealing then?

G: I was not aware that I was doing it, but I was doing it. It was a source of income. When I think back on it I can remember going down there and getting a trade slip for sixty or seventy dollars, and this would have been in 1962 or 1963. That was a fairly significant amount of money that I could turn into a lot of books.

T: You are younger than I am, I think.

G: I am sixty years old. ...So that's how I got started in the book business. What happen next was that I realized there were books that I wanted that I couldn't afford. And I started buying additional books that I knew other people wanted, people who were like-minded in terms of my interests, such as Custer. I found that I could sell them these books at a profit.

T: To people you knew?

G: Yes, other people who were interested in Custer. They come out of the woodwork when you start to talk about this stuff. And all of a sudden I started accumulating books. Then, when I was a graduate student at the University of Montana...

T: Where did you go to college?

G: I went to several colleges, but I have a degree from the State University of New York. I was at graduate school at the University of Montana. In Missoula, I used to wait for the bus in front of a bookshop that sold mostly new books and every pulp magazine printed at the time. Sometimes, as I was waiting on cold afternoons, I would go in and look around. Among the terrible books that were in there, I'd see little gems up high on the shelves. I'd see these University of Oklahoma and University of Nebraska books, perfect, brand new in dust jackets that had been there for some time -- books on Western subjects. One day I just casually asked the guy about them, and he said "Oh, we used to sell a lot of them, but we don't do that anymore.... The basement is filled with them."

T: Oh my God.

G: I said "Really?" He said "Yeah, you like those books? I'll sell you any of those books for ten cents on the dollar." I said "What do you mean?" He said, "Well, if a book is priced at five dollars, you can have it for fifty cents." And I said, "Boy, this is great." But I didn't have any money. We had a chapter of Phi Alpha Theta there, the national fraternity for historians. I was a member and the faculty advisor was Dr. Harry Fritz, an Alexis de Tocqueville specialist, and a great educator. The book Undaunted Courage by Stephen Ambrose is dedicated to him. I convinced him, without too much effort, to buy all these books with Phi Alpha Theta money, so we could have a book sale to benefit the fraternity.

So we had this great book sale up in the faculty rooms at the University of Montana, where we hauled all this stuff up Collins Avenue and laid it all out. The best part was that we got books for ourselves for next to nothing.

That was the first time I ever participated in a move of a large number of books. Would that I could stumble across them today! They were wonderful books. All jacketed firsts of important books on all those Western Americana subjects, everything from Black Elk Speaks to Red Cloud´s Folk by George Hyde. And they were just languishing in the basement of this place, because nobody was buying them, even back then.

T: When did you decide to formally become a bookseller?

G: 1980.

T: So there's a missing decade in there. Were you doing other things?

G: I was. I was indulging my youth. I played professional box lacrosse for a number of years with teams in Canada.  I played with the Akron (NY) Senecas, Victoria (BC) Shamrocks, the Nanaimo (BC) Blues, the Saint Regis (QUE) Mohawks, Morrisburg (ONT) Rattlers, Lethbridge (AL) Ebony Hawks.

T: That's exciting.

G: I loved it. That's what I did. I was a lacrosse bum.

T: So, 1980 -- that's when you opened a store?

G: I opened a store with Karen in a tiny little space in Ogunquit, Maine, where we took over the lease of a failing art gallery. We had bought a small lot of books at an auction, that was our startup stock. And it was fun. Ogunquit is beautiful in the summer, nice ocean breezes, plenty of tourists, and it was fun. From there we moved to Wells, Maine, and took over a used paperback shop that a friend of a friend wanted to sell. We culled out thousands of used paperbacks and turned it into a used bookshop that sold hardcover books. Slowly we expanded into the space in the back until we had taken up the entire 1000 square feet.

T: What was the store called?

G: Snug Harbor Books. Then we bought the home and barn of David Paulhus, who is still a bookseller in Kennebunk. We redid his barn and we had some of the better books in there. We called that Austin's Books. We ran the two shops concurrently.

We had Snug Harbor south of the corners, Austin's Books north of the corners, and for one summer we also opened up York Beach Books in York Beach, about fifteen miles south. Karen ran that. That shop was a combination of remainders, used paperbacks, and a few used hardcover books. That was the summer where we ate every meal in a restaurant. We were completely out straight. We had two or three people working for us. We had an employee at the other place. The house and Snuggy would close at six, and I would head down to meet Karen and spend the rest of the night until ten at York Beach Books.

We had a lot of fun. We did the three stores for one year, and we did two stores for a number of years. Then it seemed time to cash out. We sold it all in 1988 and moved back to Upstate New York. But it really wasn't the place to live for us, so after two years we moved back to Wells and opened another bookshop.

T: It seems like this shop in Wilmington has been here a long time.

G: This place has been here fourteen years, since 1993. We moved back to Wells in 1990, and we ran a bookshop there in which Ben Koenig (owner of The Country Bookshop in Plainfield, VT) and I actually were partners. I rented a big space. I really didn't have that many books in it. I wasn't that excited about accumulating books, it seems. So I proposed this crazy idea that Ben and I would split the space. Ben would drive down books from Vermont, put them out, and Karen would run the store, and everything was clearly marked. Every week or two he would come down with more books, and we did that for a couple of years.

T: He would bring books from Vermont over to Wells, Maine?

G: Yes. Ben also spent one summer running a shop up in Bar Harbor.

T: He met you up there?

G: No, we've known each other for years. I remember the first time we ever got to know each other. It was at the Concord Book Fair, and Milly his daughter was a little girl, probably eight years old, a very bright engaging little girl. I went into Ben's booth, and was looking at books, and I bought a book from her. At the end of the day we were leaving and I noticed that Ben had a flat tire, and I helped him change the flat. We've just been friendlier and friendlier ever since.

T: You guys together are the foundation of VABA, right?

G: No, no. Ben is the founding father. That was years before I got here. VABA was up and running years before I showed up.

T: When did VABA start?

G: I don't know exactly. But it had to be thirty years ago. Ben was one of the four or five people that started it. I think the Adelsons, Dwayne Whitehead, John Greenberg, and a couple other people.

T: Tuttle maybe?

G: I don't know, maybe. Young Charlie Tuttle, whom I met when he was about eighty, another legend.

[Note: The Vermont Antiquarian Booksellers Association was begun in 1976 by three booksellers: Ben Koenig (The Country Bookshop, in Plainfield), Ken Nims (The Book Shop, in Ludlow, later of Brattleboro Books in Brattleboro), and Clint Fisk (The Haunted Mansion Bookshop, in Cuttingsville). The first VABA brochure was issued in 1976, listing the shops of sixteen original members. We are preparing a detailed history of VABA to be posted on the VABA website.]

T: So obviously Ben being here had some influence on you coming to Vermont.

G: No, I always wanted to live in Vermont. I had this thing about Vermont. I wasn't an ocean person. As much as the coast of Maine if attractive, I'm not compelled to live near the ocean. But I like the mountains, I like the rivers. This terrain makes me very comfortable.

T: Why did you choose Wilmington?

G: Because I was driving up and down every road in the state of Vermont. I actually thought I was going to end up in Burlington. I'm glad I didn't. As we say in Vermont, Burlington is a lovely city and so close to Vermont. We were criss-crossing the state, we looked everywhere, we looked in Rutland, we looked in Brattleboro, and we were on our way back to Maine and we stumbled across beautiful Wilmington, Vermont. We passed an 1840's house that had a for-sale sign on it and was completely empty. It seemed to be so available, and such a lovely spot. It overlooked the spot where the Deerfield River flows into Lake Whitingham.  

We drove by it and Karen said "Did you see that? Pull over."  So we went back and walked around it. We walked around to the back. I just instinctively tried the door and it was open. It was completely empty, it was for sale, and I walked through and took a quick tour of the house without a real estate person. The house had an addition on it, and we thought we could make a shop out of the addition.

We started making some phone calls, trying to find out who was selling it. Then we came across this building, where the shop is located. This was a restaurant first, then it became an office space for a construction company. After that it became a second-hand consignment store. Then, on a subsequent trip, we noticed it too was empty. We said "What a perfect place for a bookshop." We tracked down the owner, who had just gotten divorced and given the building to his wife. I called her. She had just sold it to John McCleod who has run the woodworking business here in Wilmington forever. I called John McCleod and said, "Would you be interested in renting that building?" "Absolutely not! Under no circumstances!" "OK, sorry," I said. "Well, what would you do with it?" "We want to open an old bookshop." "Really? Do you have any experience?" I said "Yeah, we've been running old bookshops for some time."

He met with us in Maine. He kept a boat in one of the harbors up there. He met with me at the Maine Diner in Wells, and before the day was over, we rented it from him. We rented it from him for eleven or twelve years, and then we bought it.

T: So you have a house down the road and you have this place?

G: Yes. Which is nice, because I can die and not have to worry about moving the books.

T: Do you have a storage barn?

G: I don't. Unfortunately that addition to the house has become too much of that.

T: Most sellers seem to have lots and lots of books in boxes.

G. I wish I did. I have this fantasy of putting an addition on the back of this building, and these big metal cases running the length of the walls, and having big sections of books.

T: I have a similar fantasy.

G: However, let me tell you, I'm not so sure that's the way to do things. This business is so labor-intensive, if you are going to do that you'd better hire some people to help you. 50,000 additional books, which will not be great books, will just weigh you down.

T: How many books do you have here?

G: I have no idea. I can't believe there are 25,000 books here.

T: Ben Koenig says he has 40,000 books.

G: He probably has more than 40,000. Ben has an enormous number of books. I'm sure I have at least 10,000.

T: I have a few general questions. Did you have any mentors or people you looked up to in the book business?

G: The first guy who helped me in the book business was Merv Slotnick, who runs East Coast Books in Wells, Maine with his wife Kaye. Strangely enough, he was not all that interested in books himself, he was terribly interested in art and in autographs. I still have on our wall the first art piece I ever bought, a Joseph Flock print from Merv. I was completely blown away by the concept that you could actually buy an autograph, the signature, or a letter or a document signed by a President or a great author. I thought all that stuff was in museums. To be able to buy and sell these things is a great kick and a privilege.

Wells was a great crucible for a young bookseller. You learned by doing, but it was intense and competitive. We had five full-time booksellers there, in this tiny little beach community; Doug Harding, Merv Slotnick, David Paulhus, Harry Polizi, and George Milki, an old timer near the end of his life, and ourselves. There were also booksellers in the other beach communities not too far away. There were thirty open shops between Portland Maine and Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

T: They were buying from each other, I'm sure.

G: Absolutely. Thirty open shops. It was remarkable.

T: Talk about a golden age.

G: All pre-internet. Merv Slotnick and I bought out first computers on the same day in 1986. We bought Mac Pluses, without any hard drives, they were optional then, in Portland, Maine. I think we paid close to $5,000 apiece for our first computers and no hard drive!   [MORE]