Library sells books to fund leisure collection

Tables and tables of books awaited the flocks of students and faculty at the South Plaza entrance of the Homer Babbidge Library on Wednesday. From 9 to 3 p.m., people were able to buy books at inexpensive prices. 

Even before 9 a.m., 30 to 40 people showed up ready to search the tables of approximately 12,000 to 15,000 books to find ones that peaked their interests. 

"The prices are awesome," said Minerva Ranjeet, a 7th semester art and painting double major.  Hardbacks, DVDs, and CDs were priced at one dollar apiece. Paperbacks, VHSs, and maps were 50 cents each, while journals were 25 cents. 

"The money that we do make from the book sale is going to the leisure reading collection and to buy e-books and to fill gaps in our collections," said David Avery, the emerging technologies, facilities and collections management librarian. This is Avery's fourth or fifth book sale over the last seven years. 

According to Avery, the library hosts a book sale "every year to a year and a half, depending on the books that we accumulate from donations." People donate books and audio to the library during the year, and after they collect a good amount, they  "go through collections in various areas of the library to see if there are gaps.  The gaps are then filled with the accrued books and because space is limited upstairs, the duplicates are put in a collection for the upcoming book sale."

Richard Bleiler, the humanities librarian in charge of the book sale, said, "Usually we wait until we have approximately 150 boxes of donated books. This year we had 500 boxes. We also received some books from the Dodd Center. So we are splitting the funds with them this year."

"Donations come from different sources," Bleiler said. "Faculty donates old research books, widows donate books from their spouses that have passed on, and readers pass on books that they are done with. One of the key donators of the music books at our sale was donated by a major writer for the New Yorker." When people are done reading and researching books, they donate them to the library so others can enjoy them as well.

At about 1:30 p.m., the price of filling a bag was reduced to $1. Then, at around 2:30 p.m., the books were free. In the past, whatever books were left over have been donated to non-profit organizations, which then donated them to third world countries, according to Bleiler and Avery. 

"I thought it was a really good turnout, I was not expecting to see this many books," said Kayla Everson, a 7th semester English Education major. Since she wants to be a middle school English teacher, Everson was looking for books to start a collection for her classroom. 

"I was looking for books from when I was younger and that are also appropriate for both boys and girls. There is a good selection of young adult literature here," Everson said.

The book sale "seemed chaotic because there isn't one section for a specific genre. It's like finding a piece of gold in a mine, definitely worth the search," Ranjeet said.