As a secondhand book shop, the thing that really drives our business isn’t selling books—it’s buying them. That’s why we venture out almost every day—to houses, libraries, and storage units throughout New England—searching for good books and the occasional treasure. In today’s episode, we’re taking a behind-the-scenes look at our book buying process, from receiving phone calls and making appointments through appraisals, offers, and, if things go well, packing up the truck. These trips keep fresh books flowing into the shop, but they’re also a little adventure: we get to see new places, meet new people, and hopefully bring back a story or two for the podcast. Join us (and our 87 specifically-sized cardboard boxes) for a journey into book buying on this fully-stocked new #brattlecast.
Brattlecast #138 - After the Gold Rush
In the late 1890s a young man named Charles Leach—along with some friends and about 100,000 other prospectors—traveled to the Yukon, hoping to strike gold. The punishingly harsh conditions and chaotic boomtowns of the Klondike gold rush have been mythologized in fiction, poetry, and film, but Mr. Leach’s letters home deliver an exceptionally rare contemporary account of day-to-day life in the far north. He became the cook for his expedition, and wrote to his wife in rich, transportive detail about supplies and budgets, wild bear steaks, and exorbitant $15 doctor visits. Ultimately, he—like so many others—left disappointed, but arguably the real treasure turned out to be the fascinating first-hand account that he wrote along the way.
Brattlecast #90 - Go West!
Ken takes a journey from West Street out to Western Massachusetts and finds a bonanza of early material on the Westward expansion. Not long after the Louisiana Purchase and the Lewis and Clark expedition, there were magazines selling the idea of missionary work, opportunity, and adventure in the Pacific Northwest, brochures encouraging people to settle and farm in the Midwest, and travel posters created by railroad companies to promote the newly created National Parks. These engaging pieces of ephemera can give us a new perspective on how it might have felt to live through this often romanticized era of American history.