Book store closing

Richard Wheeler sends this new story along:

Revered bookstore to shut its doors this year
By Ramón Rentería / El Paso Times Copyright 2007 by El Paso Times

Yvonne Morgan, a teacher at Clardy school, looked through history books at the Book Gallery at 2706 E. Yandell. The store's owner, George Skanse Jr., plans to move the store because he can no longer afford to pay its property taxes.

Joseph Blackburn loves going on safaris in the Book Gallery, a used and rare bookstore in El Paso since the 1950s and now looking at closing down.

The store is so popular among literary circles in El Paso and the United States that Pulitzer Prize-winning author Cormac McCarthy, a longtime customer, still drops in sometimes.

For Blackburn, every shelf in the rustic two-story building located at 2706 E. Yandell Drive represents tons of undiscovered adventures.

"I find things I can't find anywhere else. And it's always a surprise," said Blackburn, a retired schoolteacher who lives near Ascarate Park.

Owner George Skanse Jr. has hung up the "going out of business" sign to try to sell at least two-thirds of the store's 300,000 books by the end of the year. He is frustrated over escalating property taxes that he said have doubled in recent years and made staying in business increasingly difficult.

....
The Book Gallery boasts an inventory of 300,000 books. The store's owner, George Skanse Jr., plans to close the bookstore after more than 50 years in operation.

Ed here:

I don't know what the situation is elsewhere but around here Half Price (a corporate giant in the used book business) is kaing things tough for small local used book dealers. I like Half Price but it is another example of how mom-and-popism in so many endeavors is becoming a thing of the past.