They swarmed: 200 people waiting at 9 a.m. on Saturday, 50 people inside just after noon on Sunday.
Beautiful fall weekend and book buyers gave up hours of sunshine to sift, sort and snap up bargains at the annual book sale hosted by the Friends of the Traverse Area District Library.
Filling the main meeting room with books and patrons for two days running, the sale was the most successful ever in terms of volume of volumes and number of buyers, estimates Mike McGuire, director of the Traverse Area District Library.
"It was really good, I think this was our record year — they were just packed in there,” he noted.
Some buyers toted boxes to fill and lists to check as they searched through thousands of books, sorted by price, as well as compact discs, video tapes, records and audio tapes. The books spanned the genres and price ranges, from cookbooks, mysteries and autobiographies to coffee table volumes, non-fiction and children's stories.
"You just come every year because you like books,” said Bob Bourne of Traverse City, who is not particular to any genre but does appreciated a good set of books. "I have a storage unit and I just keep buying books.”
A fundraising event, this year preliminary estimates have the book sale bringing in $14,000, a slight increase over last year's total. The money raised is used for programming at the libraries in the district as well as to fund the annual author talk associated with Traverse City Reads. The author visit by James Bradley to discuss this year's Traverse City Reads book, "Flags of Our Fathers,” is scheduled for October 25 at the City Opera House.
"If we wanted to continue doing certain things, we'd have to pull it from other resources,” said McGuire. "It's a big help.”
The help comes in part from a flow of donated items throughout the year, with peaks during spring housecleaning season and end-of-summer moving times. McGuire's staff sorts the bounty, getting rid of any items without resale value.
"Unfortunately, some of them we just have to recycle because they are in just such bad shape or outdated,” he said.
They also have a keen eye for the other end of the spectrum and sell a few rare or valuable items on Amazon as a fundraiser. This year, some special pieces were kept back for a future live auction event, what McGuire envisions as a wine-and-cheese evening someday he hopes will attract another bevy of readers.
A self-described "huge reader,” Eric Hines marks the date of the book sale on his calendar well in advance. Attending both days this year, as many serious shoppers do, he was assiduously filling a box with tomes to savor later.
"I'm not a collector, I'm just looking for good stuff to read,” said Hines.
Wilma Fink of Traverse City is another annual regular and a devoted reader with eclectic tastes who likes "just about everything.” Consuming an average of four or five books a week, she made sure to return Sunday after Saturday's crowds made it difficult to look at the books.
"These are very good prices, I go to garage sales all the time to find books,” said Fink. "I'd rather read than watch TV.”
"I've got books all over the house — the basement, upstairs, everywhere,” she added.
Intrigued by the overwhelming interest in the sale as well as the huge selection, Ron Russell of Traverse City attended both days of the book sale. He was in the early shift Saturday and Sunday and found the crowds heartening.
"It says to me that at least some people in Traverse City are intelligent, there are at least 200 bibliophiles here,” he concluded.