Booksellers, was Bulb and Seed Exchange

Booksellers, was Bulb and Seed Exchange
Randall P. Linke (Sun, 29 Mar 2020 18:52:54 PDT)

Sadly, from my perspective, you are generally correct in all your
statements. My brother-in-law owns a rare book business and it is a very
small market, getting smaller with each passing year.

Having dealt with the "valued collections" of various types from beloveds
who have died, I would postulate that for most of us our value in our
collections far exceeds what anyone else would value them at. So many
assessments are emotional and, in this age, even what was once widely
valued is greatly discounted.

It isn't always easy to accept, but I generally believe that when I'm gone
most of what I own will be viewed as so much junk by whomever is left to
dispose of it.

Not trying to be a downer, but my view now is to enjoy and make use of your
treasures. You enjoy them and the hope that someday someone else may is
nothing you can control.

Break out the special silver, china and crystal. Use it, you can't take it
with you and it won't be appreciated 50 years from now.

As for your plants, see if you can find people or institutions near you
that may be interested. Many botanical gardens will only accept items with
proven provenance. Even your prized collection could end up in the plant
sale or compost pile. I had a botanical garden give a collection of over
200 plants 125 species I'd gathered "give" them to a board member who ran a
nursery and landscaping business when they cancelled a project I'd been
developing for them.

On Sun, Mar 29, 2020, 6:28 PM Robert Lauf <boblauf@att.net> wrote:

This is a general problem we all face. When you go, assume the total
contents of your house has a negative value, i.e., someone will need to be
paid to haul it away. The value of arcane books continues to shrink as the
number of hobbyists shrinks (along with the number of people who can read
or want to). One university I know will only take donations of important
old books for its library if you wrap each volume in a $25 check to pay for
some grunt to catalog it in. News flash: after it is cataloged in, no one
will read it there anyway. University libraries are all nothing but
terminals now.
Whatever you spent on your collection of Depression glass, Hopi katchinas,
or whatever, should be mentally written off for the enjoyment it already
brought you, and if it yields anything at the end, consider it gravy. If
you had spent that money on opera tickets, you wouldn't expect anyone to
pay for your collection of ticket stubs. Start giving things away while
you can and realize that a book that someone else will open now and then is
doing the world more good than a book that is on your shelf and hasn't been
opened in ten years (and I have plenty of those!)
Just my opinion, based on an extensive collection of orchid books that
likely isn't worth much...
Bob LaufOak Ridge, TN
On Sunday, March 29, 2020, 08:58:01 PM EDT, SARAH-LISTS <
sarah-lists@suiattle.net> wrote:

Hi Jim
I don’t have nearly as fine a collection as you do, but I do have my
mothers (a collector of garden books also) and my own libraries, with some
interesting titles among them As I’m getting up there, I’d also thought of
donating them to the horticultural library here. I do know however that
many books would probably end up in the libraries book sale :(

Have you come up with any other ideas as to what you might do with your
collection?

Thanks
Sarah

Sent from my iPhone

On Mar 29, 2020, at 13:38, Jim McKenney via pbs <

pbs@lists.pacificbulbsociety.net> wrote:

 The future of books and independent book sellers has been on my mind a

lot lately., mostly because of a shocking event in the recent past. I've
been lucky enough to have built a fine personal library of garden books.
Highlights include several well known titles from the time of Elizabeth and
Shakespeare, all seventeen volumes of the pre- WWI Present Day Gardening
Series. a just-about-full complete run of the Carl Foerster- Camillo
Schneider Gartenschoenheit, 1920-1944 (lacking a few sheets from the last
years published during WWII), most of the Lily Yearbooks of the Royal
Horticultural Society, first edition Jekylls, and hundreds of other titles
important in their day. I'll be eighty in a few years, and one recent event
has me wondering about the fate of my library. In the past I was dismayed
when local "arboretums" were gifted notable collections of plants from
local amateur collectors. The dismay came later when new curators decided
to trash the collections. I'll never give my plants to such an
organization. But these organizations keep libraries, and books don't
harbor disease or require watering, heating or much of anything else but
space. And so for years I've toyed with the idea of donating my library to
such an organization. But no longer: one of our local arboretums recently
deaccessioned their library on short notice; After the select few (not I)
were given first choice, JohnQPublic was invited in to squabble among
themselves for the remainders (at a very reasonable cost per book).This is
the age we now live in: these organizations can make more money hosting
weddings and holiday extravaganzas, so those are the sort of things which
get priority - while the books get kicked out. But my books will not be
among them.

Jim McKenney
_______________________________________________
pbs mailing list
pbs@lists.pacificbulbsociety.net
http://lists.pacificbulbsociety.net/cgi-bin/…

_______________________________________________
pbs mailing list
pbs@lists.pacificbulbsociety.net
http://lists.pacificbulbsociety.net/cgi-bin/…