"Collecting is an empty vanity unless its useful", stated Harry Ransome, as the reason for his extensive compilation of archival material in the  Research Center at Univ. Texas in Austin.

     In our own instance of this at the Osterville Village Library, Donor Judy Staples must have thought the same, and her Collector-Aunt   Andrea  Leonard, obviously did think the same.  At her death, Ms. Leonard left 28 sizeable boxes of books, pamphlets, historical tracts, photographs, sermons, all relating to Cape Cod and its villages, most relating to the sea and village life over the last three hundred years.

      Even in boxes, they covered the living room floor.  Spread out, they occupied several rooms. Ms. Leonard's wishes were for her neice, Judy, to offer them to the various libraries in the area, making them available to future generations for reading, viewing, and use in research. They are meant to be sequestered in Special Historical Collections.

    OVL was invited to be among the first to choose genealogical sourcebooks, reference books, and general interest books that fit  into our view for the new library.  Several books were so rare they are not offered for sale anywhere on the Internet. One book was a listing of ships in Barnstable Harbor 1813-1914.  There was a book of photographs of Nantucket 100 years ago.  One was a first hand account of the great  1906 fire that burned most of San Francisco. There are many  accounts of the fire, but very few first hand accounts of someone who was there and whose house was destroyed while she watched  it.  One was a signed First Edition of a Joseph Lincoln novel, rare and wonderful.  

     At present, they are awaiting accessioning in the Friend's Bookstore, in a secure location.  In the future, they will be the seminal selections for the Historical Collections in our new library.

     If you have a family library, or any collection of historical books, i.e. reference books,  genealogies, family histories, diaries, journals, books of photographs, please consider giving them to OVL.  We will promise to come to your location and consider them as gifts; we cannot promise to take everything away.  We are looking for materials of historical interest.

David Yount

Went to an Estate Sale this summer, had to get up at cockcrow to get there for the opening, and there's no other best time to go. The early worm gets the books or other items and she has to get in line on a dewy morning to do so. As a bookhunter, I was surprised at the number of good books left on the shelves. At $2 each, your choice of hundreds of books. Classic novels, a Study on Beavers, an 1853 book on American Flora, a Somerset Maugham First Edition. Just reach up and over the guys also reaching for books, hip to hip, jockeying for position. If you like this sort of thing, this will be the kind of thing you like. Not everbody does.

My thought: Why didn't that family call the OVL and arrange to have our Resident Expert on Book Values come to their home and select out books that could be sold through our Book Sales? What a thoughtful gift! Those revenues directly help with Library projects. Gifts can be designated for the new Library building.

Wednesdays
9:00 a.m. - 12:00 noon 
We are now open every Saturday

 from 10:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m.

We continue to ask you for donations of good books for re-sale in our Freinds of the Library bookstore downstairs in the Library--and you respond-- sometimes with 50 books, sometimes with 500.  When you do, we go through each book and find some interesting Things Left In Books like:

 

1) A cocktail napkin with signature of O.J. Simpson, which nobody on our Volunteer Staff of 8 people are willing to touch;

 

2) Other signatures like Poets W.H. Auden (rare) and James Dickey. The latter writes in a letter that he will be happy to meet a friend in NYC and attempt to find a bar which he has not discovered in other pub crawls.

 

3) Small package of sand from Normandy beach from WWII.

 

4) Fifties map of Cape Cod centering on Lincoln's home in Chatham.

 

5) Century old pressed leaves,rose petals, still fragrant.

 

6) John O'Toole's college exams from 1949.

 

7) Postcard to Jay Larman (Friend of the Library) from Dartmouth College, asking for return of overdue Emerson book, 1948.    Jay, still the Classicist. Brings smiles to the faces of Margaret MacGowan and Marcia Finley, two Volunteers, who have been volunteering time and talents for many years.

 

 

David Yount, Volunteer

Have you ever wondered what to do with your local family and local history collections?   Call the Library!   Together with the Osterville Historical Society, we are working to preserve historical materials about Osterville, its families, and its businesses.     

 

Help us preserve Osterville history !

Newest January acquisitions for Friends of the Library Book Sales
from  the O'Toole Family, Oyster Harbors:  800 clean,as new, books on
Travel, Advertising as a Field and Occupation, and first edition novels
by John Updike, John Cheever, and Philip Roth, all at heavily discounted
prices.  Come in and see.

We are beating the drums for our new Permanent Collection of old and
rare books on Cape Cod History, Family Histories of Osterville folk,
and other long-time businesses in Osterville.  We promise to care for them. 

Give them to us in honor of someone.  We'll take it from there.

 Want to know what your old volume is worth? Bring it on Wednesdays
9-12.  David Yount will share the internet valuations for your book with
you.

The O'Toole family has donated a dozen John Updike novels for sale in
our Friends of the Library Sale.  Most are stated First Edition copies!
Take them all.  Very reasonable prices.

Books on Art ,( doing it, collecting it, viewing it) are front and
center in our Sales this week, from the largesse of a local family. 
Come see!