VILLAGE OF FAYETTEVILLE – The Fayetteville Free Library hosted its one-off “10 Years of Treasures” sale Sunday morning. The event from 9 a.m. to noon saw vintage, collectible and specialty books spread across the tables of the Emma Beard Room on the library’s first floor.
As its name suggested, the event was the culmination of a decade or so spent piling and sorting through a backlog of books donated from the community and beyond. The items brought up from the basement, none of which had previously been available for purchase at the library, were evaluated beforehand for their worth, rarity and condition.
“The library was closed for a lot of COVID and we weren’t able to volunteer, and then once we were, there weren’t a lot of books coming in, so we had to find something else to do and that’s when I really started working on this project fullheartedly,” said Barbara Harris, a volunteer at the library since 2015. “This stuff had been sitting in the basement for so long, so it’s nice to have it back out and have the extra space downstairs now.”
Since the March 26 sale had been in the works for years with the books temporarily kept from the public eye and excluded from the library’s general biannual sales, an event of its type will not happen again any time soon according to Laurel Flanagan, the operation and facilities manager for the library on Orchard Street.
The selection of reading material included leather-bound box sets, art books like one showing the complete murals of Diego Rivera, first editions of Hardy Boys mystery novels, and books delving into subjects ranging from American Civil War history and Bronze Age China to robotics, gardening, wood carving and cooking.
The items were sold at reduced prices because the library received the collection for free and sought to rehome what they’ve held onto. The proceeds raised through the sale went back to the library to support programming and other services.
“It doesn’t do us any good to sit on this stuff and try to sell it for the absolute top dollar because we want to appeal to the public, to casual collectors, to resellers and to serious collectors,” Harris said the morning of the sale.
She said the Emma Beard Room was full immediately after the doors were unlocked slightly past 9 a.m. and that half of the books on display were sold within the first 45 minutes of the sale.
Rebecca Flanagan, the daughter of Laurel and a library volunteer herself, said it was a “mad house” at the very beginning of the event.
“Being able to walk in before everybody comes in, it was really cool because you get to see everything in all of its glory,” Rebecca said. “You really have to orient yourself because as soon as the doors open it’s a wave of people. I was amazed at how quick the books just went flying off the tables.”
Anything left at the end of the “10 Years of Treasures” sale is being set aside to go into a special display section for when the next basement book sale comes along in May.