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Awesome “collector” documentary The booksellers.
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24 posts in this topic

I thought the doc was OK but the second half had some foreboding quotes about people not reading anymore, much less collecting books. One thing I noticed, these dealers sold a lot more than books (prints, manuscripts, letters, postcards), but I didn't see any comic books anywhere among their wares. 

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1 hour ago, Changer said:

looks like the cute rare book advisor that cameos in pawn stars is in this... bonus!
 

Hmm, I don’t seem to recall a book advisor ... which one is he?   I guess I haven’t watched enough episodes.

 

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I grew up hunting old book stores. Yes, looking for comics as well as pulps, other magazines and the occasional book as well. It was one of the only ways other than garage sales, flea markets and friends to find old comics. There were no comic shops, mail order or internet. The picture of that green door and the look inside brings back a lot of memories. 

There were numerous shops in my area that I rode to on my bike armed with a little lawn cutting and paper route money. When I got older, I took the bus to down town LA and Hollywood on my hunts. 

The best shops were Cherokee Books, Collector’s Book Store and Bond Street Books in Hollywood. Just amazing early comic shops with mind blowing books. 

I bought anything old and cool. If it had a 10 cent cover price and rarely priced over 25 cents, it was fair game. I sure wish I still had them all. 

And yeah, the line about the book store owners not wanting to sell you stuff was some thing I remember well. They seemed to treat the stuff like they were their children. I remember having small stacks of old comics taken from me and put behind the counter even though they had small penciled prices on the back. 

I remember thinking why? And how they could stay in business if they wouldn’t sell anything? I guess they didn’t...

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Just watched this last week (I ordered the DVD).  My parents were rare book dealers, and I helped out in their original shop quite often, so it brings back memories.  We actually had a number of the books shown.  Something rather sad though... we're shown one of the largest rare book shows in the nation (world?), and yet judging from the overhead views, it really isn't all that crowded (maybe 1000?).  I'm guessing years ago attendance would have been multitudes of that.

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Thank you for the recommendation Knights.  We watched it last night and enjoyed it.

I grew up in Denver, and there was a local celebrity named John Dunning who hosted an old time radio show on Sunday afternoons.  Dunning also ran an antique bookstore in Denver called the Old Angonquin, and he authored some well received suspense novels centering on a book collector in Denver. His bookstore was a delight as was his radio show.

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My wife and I watched it tonight.  Highly recommended documentary for those fascinated with the book collecting culture.  (thumbsu

I've actually been to Booked up in Archer city, Texas (it was called All Booked Up back then).  Larry McMurtry used to own five separate collector bookstores on Main Street in the town (the town was featured in McMurtry's Hud and used as a film location in The Last Picture Show).  This was his way of trying to help save the community.  As a business, All Booked Up was run on the honor principle out of one main building.  A Metroplex science fiction club I'm in used to do annual sojourns to Archer City.  We called them "bookstore crawls" ...short of pub crawls with the pun being a play on the word publisher.  During one of those trips it started to rain while several of us were checking out books in the main store.  Since we weren't finished shopping at the other main street stores Larry gave folks a lift down the block and back in his pick-up.  

BTW, there was an inherent awareness that the stores were owned by an author because there was a half-consumed bottle of scotch sitting right next to the cash register. 

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This has just been put on my 'to watch list'. Growing up in small-town Ontario near Georgian Bay, I had the great opportunity to foster two of my early passions at one store: The Odd Copy Book Shop (Odd Copy and Old Fort Road Book Shop).  The original owner of the store had turned an old school house into this amazing book store on the outskirts of my town (Midland).  I remember biking there (about a 30 minute bike ride from home) with a back-pack, ready to take home a few of the thousands of books he had on the main and basement floors.  The bonus was that he was a lover of comics, and many of the books that ended up in our first collection came from that wonderful store. The link below takes you to a documentary made by a college student about the shop, long after the weekly summer bike rides I made to the shop in the mid-late seventies. If you can freeze the video at the 4:11 mark, you will see the old school bell and some books hanging to the right.  That's where the original owner used to hang up the Ditko Spideys, the first thing I would see when i entered the shop! :cloud9: As the new owner did some clean-up, you can still see some images of comics in the doc.

 

 

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There was a little old school used bookstore in my area that I used to ride my bike to. I would go in and ask for comics. The old man would grunt and point to a nearby box of comics for 25 cents each. Mostly Archie, Harvey and fairly recent DC. Always picked over.

One day, I thought I would browse a little. The old man usually had his nose buried in a newspaper smoking his cigar. 

I spotted a pile of old b/w Life mags. I saw a little green peeking out of the edge so I slid it out. It was a single digit WDCS. Carefully penciled on the back was $2.00. Score. I went through the pile and picked out another book I don’t remember and then there was Superman #9. By far the oldest Supe I’d ever seen also with the $2.00 pencil mark on back. 

I checked my pocket of lawn cutting money and went back to the quarter box and picked out a few and walked up to the old man. 

He started counting and then hit one of the $2. Books. He made a face and asked where I found it. He told me it wasn’t for sale and wasn’t 25 cents. I pointed out the price on back and said I would pay that. He was grumbling and I pulled out my money. When he saw I had enough, he took my money and handed me the books. Off I rode on my bike like a Cheshire Cat! 

I never found anymore old comics in there but the local folklore among the neighborhood kids was that there were more, many more in the basement. It was roped off and I could never get down there. I always to this day wonder...

 

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Watched this a few months back when I saw your post on IG - great film.  

Does anyone know of a similar feature length doc about comic collectors?  I watch a lot of films, including a lot of docs on comics, but not comic book collecting.  I've looked but can't seem to find one, which seems strange because within the last few months I've watched:

The Booksellers (collectors of old books), Nintendo Quest (guy collecting all 600+ NES games in person acquisitions only and only has 30 days), and Jack of All Trades (about sports card collectors).

Where's the comic collector doc?

Edited by RedGiant
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