By James Lomuscio
Neither Saturday’s morning downpour nor today’s heat wave, not to mention the Fine Arts Festival in nearby Parker Harding Plaza, could keep the bibliophiles at bay.
Mimi Greenleee, book sale chair, directs book buyers at Saturday’s opening.(CLICK TO ENLARGE) Dave Matlow for WestportNow.com
The Westport Library’s 23rd annual summer book sale, one of its largest fundraisers, drew an estimated 5,000 persons Saturday to peruse the stacks containing 80,000 books arrayed by subject under the white tents on Jesup Green and inside the Westport Library, according to organizers.
And even with today’s humidity and temperatures in the 90s, 855 book lovers were tallied by 2 p.m.
“There are lots of people here looking for all kinds of stuff, buying children’s books, reference books, fiction, astronomy, and there’s a whole AV tent,” said greeter Robin Welling. “So, things are good. It’s been a steady stream.’
State Sen. Toni Boucher bought a paper bag’s worth of children’s books for her grandchildren. One, Joshua Prince’s “I Saw an Ant on the Railroad Track” seemed an appropriate gift from a ranking member of the state’s Transportation Committee.
“I can’t wait to give it to my grandchildren,” Boucher said.
Mimi Greenlee, Book Sale chairwoman, said that the arts festival going on at the same time did not detract from her event, but fueled it.
“It’s ‘Weekend in Westport,’” she said. “They look forward to browsing the works of artists along the river, and then they come here.”
If there were any hint of disappointment, it was that the auction of two rare books on eBay Saturday did not fetch the results event planners had anticipated.
Walt Disney’s “The Adventures of Mickey Mouse” published in 1931, which is the first appearance of the cartoon character Mickey Mouse, plus Donald Duck’s first mention in print, did not reach the established minimum bid.
Dick Lowenstein, book sale volunteer since 1994, had said that with $2,900 opening bid, there had been high hopes of it being hammered down for nearly twice as much. He said the same title sold last fall for $5,500 at a New York auction house.
The other book heading on eBay, “Colton’s General Atlas,” an 1872 text with 180 steel-plate maps, went for $1,300, just $200 more than the opening bid.
According to Lowenstein, the summer book sale, one of three such sales the Westport Library holds throughout the year, is the organization’s second largest fundraiser after “Booked for the Evening.”
Greenlee said the summer sale, staffed by 300 volunteers who collect donated books, sort and store them, typically nets $100,000.
This year, however, that amount will be reduced by about 5 percent since the library had to rent to pods to store books and hire staff to handle them, Greenlee said.
The reason: local preservationists had argued that the texts stored at the abandoned mansion on the town-owned Baron’s South property were compromising the1950s structure’s floor joists and violated local zoning regulations. Books have been stored there for the past 15 years.
Greenlee said that because of the complaints, town officials have asked the library to vacate the Golden Shadows mansion.
“We’re looking for a spot, and rental prices have ranged from $15,000 to $96,000 from Norwalk to Bridgeport,” she said. “The question is, ‘How much does the community value the book sale and the library?’”
According to Lowenstein, the library is currently eyeing storage rental space on Post Road East. He also said that by losing free storage at Golden Shadows, the town will take the financial hit, not the library.
“The town is going to be out that money because the library is funded 80 percent by the town,” Lowenstein said. “This is a public library, not a private one.”
The book sale continues Monday when everything is marked down 50 percent, from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Tuesday, July 21, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
