Bob Schilling of Schillingslist, Gresham, Oregon

I’m Bob Schilling, a 46 year old bibliophile living in Gresham, Oregon; a native of the Northwest, born and raised in Seattle, WA; and a resident of Oregon since 1999. My wife of 22 years, Arlyee (pronounced like “Charlie” without the “Ch”) and I started Schillingslist Select Used Books in the fall of 2004. It’s a supplemental income for us, one that is ever growing, but more importantly, it’s a supplemental passion. Like many of you, I love to traffic in books, love to browse them, love to read them, love to be around them, love to handle them, love to find them and love selling them.

My Pilgrimage into Books

My love of books coincides with a religious conversion that happened to me shortly before my 21st birthday. I’d been a good student through high school, but got lost for a couple of years, dropped out of college, worked a few different jobs and lived for the night life and the weekends. Through the influence chiefly of my father, who was converted later in life, I became a Christian at age 20 and shortly thereafter renewed my education at a three year Bible College. I met my wife during my last year there. We were married a few months after my graduation, and then proceeded to pursue the course of our lives and the raising, eventually, of four children.

I became a book guy in Bible College to the point that when my wife was pregnant with our first son, I seriously pleaded my case to name him, “Book.” I thought it could be a cool name, unique, maybe not too weird. My Booker T. Washington arguments notwithstanding, the good sense of my wife prevailed, and our son Patrick was given a less peculiar name; an event that to this day, makes him forever grateful to his mother! But, to back up again, I had the good fortune of an older Bible teacher who took a liking toward me. In my second year of college, he sponsored me for a trip with a tour group that he was leading to Israel, Jordan, Egypt and Greece. I was there introduced to papyri and incunabula; and through him, to the vast world of books.

Thrift stores, garage sales and used book stores became my frequent haunts during this time, and I was bit by the bug, snagged by the hook, or whatever metaphor best describes that captivation that took hold of me for the bound printed word. Theology was the content of my choice, but the pursuit of volumes in this field led to broader and broader landscapes of subject matter, and also to an appreciation for fine bindings, for beauty, for the antiquarian, for the rare, and even for the odd.

To feed my habit I sold books occasionally to used book stores. I developed relationships with a few booksellers, and though never officially a “scout,” I was frequent enough in my selling transactions that essentially I was one. Some friendships and relationships remain to this day from my early years of selling to dealers.

My personal library over the years has been a revolving one, which helps me as a bookseller, because I’m not a huge collector. I’ve gone through seasons of collecting this or that. We collected nearly all the Landmark history books when my children were growing up, along with similar series like “We Were There” and “Signature Books.” We’ve always had a good collection of classic literature, and all my kids have also enjoyed their way through The Little House on the Prairie books, the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew (I was a Beverly Cleary and Danny Dunn fan as a boy), The Chronicles of Narnia, The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and all the Harry Potter books. My wife has long been a reader of historical fiction and mysteries. I’ve gravitated to theology, biography and history; and most lately to books on books. As I grow older I tend to hang on to volumes that have peculiar meaning to me based on content, usefulness, reference value, and worthwhile qualities to pass on to my children. Strange as it sounds, though not uncommon, I wouldn’t buy a lot of the books I sell; I’m just not that much of a collector, and I’m kinda’ cheap.

I continued to pursue a theological education through three years part-time and then two years full-time in Seminary. In this pursuit of further education, we sold or gave away most of our belongings and towed a 5′ x 8′ U-Haul trailer behind our station wagon across the country. That small trailer contained all that we owned, and my wife is still glad to remind me that ¾ of it was my collection of books.

We moved to what was a Mecca for Christian books in the United States, Grand Rapids, MI. Numerous Christian publishers and two of the largest used Christian book stores in the country were located there: Kregal’s Used Book Store and Baker Book House (with many lesser known shops that I soon discovered). I was in religio-biblio heaven and proceeded to strain and bust our pocketbook with acquisitions that “I just couldn’t pass up.” In my five years there, I learned a lot about theology and an equal amount about books. It was there that I made acquaintance with Joel Beeke, a local Pastor and book dealer; a bibliophile like few I’ve ever known. He currently is involved in both publishing and the selling of new and used books; and as part of a Seminary under his leadership, has developed one of the world’s largest collections of primary and secondary sources on Puritan theology. www.heritagebooks.org

My Venture into Online Bookselling

It was my father who first mentioned to me in 2003 that his pastor was selling used books online, and maybe it was something that I should look into. It was just the previous year that Stephen Windwalker had released his book, Selling Used Books Online, which I bought and devoured. I culled my personal library and started with a thousand dollars to buy additional inventory. I made many mistakes those first few months, fulfilling that adage that a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. I did well buying theology, and learned some quick tips to help me with non-fiction, but wasted hundreds of dollars buying “signed” and “first edition” fiction. Fiction is obviously a major collectable field, and many a bookseller’s staple stock, but it wasn’t an area I knew well enough to start with.

Around this same time, late 2003, early 2004, I came across www.bookthink.com. Craig Stark became an unknown mentor. The newsletters, the articles, the links, and the forum were to have a huge impact on my bookselling as I started online. I read as much as I could, trying to add to the select areas of bookselling that I knew relatively well. I downloaded ABE’s free HomeBase database, and started listing my books. I didn’t do my initial upload until January 2, 2005.

I got my feet wet selling first on ABE, and then added Alibris, Amazon, Biblio, ChooseBooks, Half, and an eBay store. I also switched to www.theartofbooks.com for my listing database, as it allowed me to list on multiple sites and manage sales efficiently. I also purchased a scanner for my cell phone and subscribed to www.scoutpal.com, a very helpful service allowing you to retrieve online prices for books while scouting. I realize that many are critical of cell phone/PDA scanners and programs, and I also realize that many have looked to them as get-rich-quick devices, misusing them and frankly giving them a bad name. But the bookseller with a passion for books and an ever-learning commitment will gain definite benefits from such technology. Nobody knows it all, nor can they; and internet pricing information in the field opens many other areas and titles that you otherwise would pass by. A larger benefit, early on, can be the savings in not buying books that are either glutted online or have very little resale value. Earlier this year I employed www.chrislands.com to build my website.

I’m a small player in this big world of online booksellers, with much to learn in a venerable trade. I may never be a full-time bookseller; but I’ll always be engaged in it at some level. It’s hard not to be who you really are. And for me, with other stewardships, bookselling as a part-time venture is probably the way that I’ll best maintain my love for it. As a supplemental avocation for me, it’s an activity that I daily look forward to. And that’s one of the other gems about this endeavor, isn’t it? You can dive in as deep as you want, swim as far as you care to, dabble in the shallow end, forge your way through the deep waters, or change your course midstream.

My Business

www.schillingslist.com

I enjoy nearly every aspect of bookselling. It’s something my wife and I can do together. She helps with some listing and shipping, and we enjoy estate sales and a little travel here and there. It’s been a pleasure to be the conduit between a number of folks and the books they’ve been looking for. I enjoy the fraternity of fellow booksellers; a mixed lot, very diverse personalities and specialties, but by and large a very good group of people who have a passion for the benefits of reading and the joy of collecting. It’s a knowledgeable group, both booksellers and book buyers, and it has led to many interesting conversations. There’s never a lack of things to learn, and the world-wideness of it with the internet is astounding. The hunt, the treasure seeking, the finds, the surprises, and a few frustrations thrown in to make it real-life; all add up to a thrilling adventure for me.

I have made the conscious choice to have fun in the hard work of this business. How cool is that? If FOL sales are becoming a pain, or if estate sales in the city are getting too competitive, then I’ll pursue those less and hit other venues more. But, I’ll never write off any of the venues. It’s an evolving thing. Hit or miss. Same with certain thrift stores. Some I swing by with more regularity than others, for good reasons, but you never know what might show up at any given venue at any given time. Of course, having the books come to you is far better, and some advertising and the frequent distribution of business cards are my means to that end.

I’ve also made the conscientious commitment to try to run every part of this business with integrity and excellence. I’m very careful in the grading of my inventory, and sell few books that are in less than Very Good condition. Every dust jacket in my inventory is in a new archival Brodart protector. Every book is wrapped in tissue, bubble-wrap and an appropriate box and padding or double-criss-crossed b-flute for safe shipment. Every domestic customer is given their Delivery Confirmation number, and all orders are unconditionally returnable within ten days (or longer if the selling venue so dictates). I don’t try to make any money on shipping; I simply try to cover my costs. I gladly provide trade discounts to fellow booksellers. I write a personal note of thanks on all my packing slips.

I specialize in Theology—particularly that branch springing from the Reformation, the Puritans and modern Evangelicalism. As with most areas of bookselling, there are a plethora of books in this niche that are nearly worthless in the second-hand market. I routinely sort through boxes of volumes and endless yards of shelving with 80-90% of the books, and up, not worth my time. But then there’s that other 1-20%, and those other exceptional sales; those mother-lodes where 80-90% is on the other end of the spectrum. My best buys, like many other dealers, have been entire libraries. Estates have been the source of some of my most valuable finds. And a few sources are bread and butter for me week in and week out. I’ve written a couple of articles regarding this specialty that can be found at Bookthink.com; and I authored two issues in their Gold Edition on reselling conservative Evangelical theology that Craig and I aptly entitled, “The God Edition, Part I and Part II.”

Outside my specialty I sell mainly non-fiction; but have some very worthwhile Modern Firsts, some Easton, Franklin and other fine press works, and a fair amount of poetry and children’s books. My secondary specialty is Americana. American history I find very interesting and selective niches have peculiar interest for me both as a bookseller and a small collector, especially Northwest Americana. And an area that I do actually collect in is the narrow category of Indian Captivity narratives. Judaism, Islam, politics, reference, the arts and sports all play other prominent roles in my inventory.

Another bookselling venture that I’ve helped revive in the metropolis that I live near (Portland, OR), is an annual book fair. As a member of our local booksellers association (PAUBA: Portland Area Used Booksellers Association) and its book fair committee, we held our first “Rose City Used Book Fair” last May and have tentatively scheduled our second one for a weekend in April, 2008. We’re a modest book fair with a wide range of books in subject matter and price. We advertise ourselves as “an unpretentious book fair.” We drew antiquarian dealers, some of whom regularly exhibit at the Seattle Used Book Fair each fall, specialty dealers and many other general used booksellers. We were able last year tokeep the costs for the participating dealers to under $100 per space (most spaces were $80 for an 8′ x 8′); and charged a $2 admission fee to the general public (or $1 and a can of food for our local food bank). The book fair was a great success, exceeding everybody’s expectations. The booksellers all made money, PAUBA more than broke even, and some contagion was started for future, annual book fairs. I would encourage any local bookseller’s associations to consider this as a future project.

That’s me, and us. We’re glad to be a part of IOBA, and glad to be of any help to fellow booksellers, and fellow book buyers.

Bob and Arlyee Schilling operate Schillingslist out of Gresham, OR

IOBA Standard, Fall Edition 2007, Volume 8, No. 4.

Victor Goldring, Goldring Books, Eastbourne, East Sussex, UK

I am Victor Goldring and trade under the simple name of Goldring Books. Based in Eastbourne, East Sussex, United Kingdom. It is operated out of our home and we sell on the internet only, with our website www.goldringbooks.com being established in 2004. I came to bookselling late in life having held a senior accounting position with an American multi-national oil corporation but decided to take early retirement at 50, too much stress and travelling having worn me down. It was certainly time to quit the “rat race” and to concentrate on enjoying life and having more free time to devote to ourselves. I am ably assisted by my wife Christine and not assisted by our cat Oliver, who regards all packaging as toys. I have always had a great love of books and have been a collector most of my life and bookselling was a logical step to take, combining a love of books with an additional income. It was good to make use of the knowledge gained over the years, although the learning curve is always ongoing, and also wonderful to be able to work from home.

Our specialist interests are French Literature, Memoirs and Biographies in translation, French Revolution, Victorian and English Authors before 1960, Juvenilia, Travel, Historical Fiction, Birds, Cats, Animals and the Paranormal / Spiritual. We carry a regular, ever changing stock of Crime Fiction, Murder Mystery, Poetry, Modern Fiction and Non-Fiction, Foreign Authors, Business, Self Help, Religion and much more. Our eclectic stock includes the scarce and unusual with many signed copies. We tend to buy books that seem to be interesting, although we may have no detailed knowledge of the subject and are always prepared to take a chance.

The enjoyment of bookselling is made more so by the appreciation of customers who have taken the trouble to compliment us on our descriptions, packaging and service. It is always pleasing when this happens. Having shipped books to some 45 countries it is also a good aspect of bookselling to be able to communicate with so many people and to answer detailed enquiries, which some may find tedious but which I feel is important, even though this may not result in a sale.

If I may quote selectively from an American customer’s long note to us, I believe this says it all.

“Firstly, I must thank you and compliment you on your excellent packaging, of which you are justly proud, and which is so terribly important, now-a-days….Secondly, I must just comment on your ‘Thank you for supporting a small independent bookseller,’ and I trust you will forgive my prolixity. I have been a bibliophile my entire life (now on the threshold of the twelfth lustrum) and a book collector for slightly over forty years. Small, independent, second-hand booksellers (that is, booksellers of second-hand books, not previously owned booksellers) have been the source of ninety percent of my books….The trade (and I emphasize that it is a trade, rather than a profession, since to my mind trades are invariably far more honest, beneficial, and pleasant than any profession) has always been an honourable one, and has always attracted men (and women) of intelligence and philosophy, with whom it has been (for the most part) a pleasure to associate with. Unfortunately (yes, even on a bright day there are always dark clouds in the distance) the inflated currencies of the last two decades, and the alluring ease with which they could be earned, saw some very disreputable persons call themselves booksellers, and this remains true today.”

I am particularly thrilled by the hunt for books to add to stock, which has taken us to some interesting places. Tracking down good books can be both enjoyable and frustrating, and many calls to sellers result in viewing extremely poor condition volumes, the ubiquitous book clubs and the over expectation of value. Some people believe that because an item is old it is worth a good price and are disappointed to be told that this is not so. A challenge I particularly like is when I view a collection of books and need to make a decision to purchase after going through hundreds of volumes and to be able to use intuitive judgment as to whether they are good to buy and sell at the right price. This does mean reviewing books at quite a speed, but with the experience of looking at many books I find that I am becoming much faster and more adept.

I enjoy the research of bibliographic information on a scarce or unusual work, if not always conclusive, and often spend far too much time trying to value a book that has no comparison and simply end up with a price that I believe to be fair.

Our plans for the future include adding more stock gradually but not to become too large and unmanageable or there would be a danger that the enjoyment factor could be lost. We are quite happy with our level of success and to be a small fish in the ocean of bookselling. We would recommend the honorable trade of bookselling to anyone, provided that they adhere to ethical standards, are committed, have a passion for books, and do not mind hard work.

I found IOBA through the forum of a certain listing site (no free plug for them!) and liked what they stood for and the ethics that they expounded. Ethics are important in any business and particularly so in selling over the internet. I am one of the few UK sellers to have joined but felt it important to belong to such an organization, and I direct customers to the code of ethics there that I subscribe to.

Victor Goldring operates Goldring Books out of Eastbourne, East Sussex in the U.K.

IOBA Standard, Fall Edition 2007, Volume 8, No. 4

Craig Horle and Laurie Wolfe of Classic Books and Ephemera

We are Craig Horle and Laurie Wolfe of Classic Books and Ephemera, which we run out of our home in Lansdowne, Pennsylvania. When we began the business in 2001 we did not anticipate the store-in-the-home phenomenon common to so many booksellers. Our cozy house is now so crammed with our stock and shipping supplies that living there has become almost secondary. However we do have room for the obligatory “bookstore cat,” Greystoke. Having eclectic interests ourselves, we have not specialized to the extent that might make good business sense, but we focus mainly on 17th to mid-19th century books in French, German, and English; late 19th and early 20thcentury military prints and postcards; and manuscripts, deeds, maps, and paper ephemera of all periods.

Craig earned a B.A. and an M.A. in English and European history from Temple University in Philadelphia and a Ph.D. in English history from the University of Maryland. He taught for the University of Maryland overseas program in England in the mid-1970s for six years and worked as an archivist, first part time and later full time, at Friends House Library in London for seven years before returning to the states in October 1980, driven out of England in part by his distaste for Margaret Thatcher and in larger part by his loathing for the never-ending inclement weather. On his return to the states, he worked for almost three years as a retail manager for the philatelic firm of Earl P. L. Apfelbaum in Philadelphia (he had been a stamp collector since childhood, but seeing the business close-up led him to sell his collection, although he has recently returned to collecting). Craig returned to the world of academe first as associate editor on The Papers of William Penn Project at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, and later as co-founder and chief editor of the Biographical Dictionary of Early Pennsylvania Legislators Project, responsible for producing the series Lawmaking and Legislators. The Biographical Dictionary Project was located initially at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, but since 1990 it has been at Temple University, where until recently Craig also taught European and English history as an adjunct professor.

Laurie earned a B.A. in English Literature from Earlham College in Indiana, an M.A. in American History from Temple University, an M.L.S. from Drexel University in Philadelphia, and a J.D. from Temple University School of Law. She has also (and perhaps most importantly!) attended four courses at the Rare Book School, two at the original location at Columbia University and two at the present location at the University of Virginia. Laurie worked as a rare book cataloguer at Bethel College in Kansas where the oppressive heat drove her slightly insane (which is sadly incompatible with Craig’s love of hot weather). She returned to Philadelphia to go to graduate school and later became a cataloger in the Rare Book Department of the Free Library of Philadelphia. Then with M.A. in History in hand, she joined the Biographical Dictionary Project as an editor in 1994, working full time until she entered law school, and then continued to work on the project part time. She passed the bar (something Craig did infrequently in England, as he loves real ale) her first go-round, but her interest in non-patent intellectual property law did not result in any local employment possibilities. (Ironically, Philadelphia is a great location for patent law, which requires a science degree but not, alas, a library science degree.)

We have lived together in Lansdowne for about ten years, tying the knot in August 2006. We decided to become bookdealers because: 1. Craig’s father, a well-known military figure maker, left a substantial collection of militaria, both books and prints, as well as Craig’s Classics Illustrated collection of comic books (which formed the backbone of Craig’s early scholastic career and which his father had secretly kept for him lo those many years); 2. The Biographical Dictionary Project has always relied on grants, almost exclusively from government sources, and thus has the potential to end suddenly, which meant that we needed a backup plan; 3. Craig is nearing retirement (and experiencing project burnout after 22 years and four published volumes) and would like to become a full-time bookdealer, as would Laurie; 4. Working at home is very appealing, even if the two of us can no longer fit together in most of the jammed rooms and are in mortal danger from falling books and cardboard; 5. Laurie is a true, passionate bibliophile and loves the challenge of the business and, as a much younger woman (11 years Craig’s junior) needs to keep busy as Craig declines into his dotage; and 6. Both of us (but especially Laurie) are good with computers; so we decided to establish a partnership and sell on eBay, gradually easing our way into online retailing.

We have been members of IOBA from the very beginning of our partnership. We now sell on eBay, Biblio, IOBAbooks, and Choosebooks and will be looking at other sites in the future, as well as creating our own website. As all of you know, dealing in books and ephemera, while often fun, enlightening, and educational, is also frustrating and constantly changing as online opportunities evolve. EBay giveth and eBay taketh away, enabling outreach to a world-wide market but adding fee upon fee and showing very little understanding of the differences between older books and widgets; moreover the addition of live online bidding access to live book auctions (which used to be a great source of material for bookdealers willing to travel to those auctions) reduces the ability of dealers to buy quality books at reasonable prices, as we now compete with both dealers and collectors worldwide for the same stock. As soon as Craig retires, we plan to do shows and to travel to purchase books and ephemera from non-auction sources. Another increasing problem for bookdealers is the impact of the USPS shipping changes and the rising cost of oil on our international business, as very few of the books we sell are amenable to shipping in a Priority envelope and, in any event, we prefer shipping in boxes. Only the present weakness of the dollar works in our favor.

We are proud to belong to IOBA and, through the discussions and profiles, have been astonished at the remarkable diversity of its membership. Obviously, we hope that more buyers will learn of the association and will come to appreciate the professionalism, knowledge, and quality of the members.

Craig Horle and Laurie Wolfe operate Classic Books and Ephemera out of Lansdowne, PA and can be contacted at cbandeph@netscape.net.

IOBA Standard, Summer Edition 2007, Volume 8, No. 3.