Blackwell's

On Friday morning I went on a tour of Blackwell’s bookstore.  Actually, it wasn’t really a tour of the store – it was a tour dealing with the history of Blackwells. 

If you’re a librarian, you probably know of Blackwell’s.  From their humble beginnings in Oxford in the late 1870s, they have risen to become a multi-dimensional company – but they still deal in books.  At CSU we used to have their approval plan, whereby we chose very specific subjects we were interested in, put a hunk of money (no so much really) in a pot, and every month or so we got newly-published titles in those areas.  We could send anything back that we didn’t want.  Over the years, I think we may have sent back only one book – a book on erotic art that was a little over the top (we don’t have a course in erotic art, to my knowledge!). 

As our guide Peter informed us, Blackwells was founded in 1879 by a young Englishman named Benjamin Blackwell.  He opened a small (like 12 ft. sq.) shop on the Broad Street in Oxford, just across from the Sheldonian Theatre (designed by Sir Christopher Wren). 

The Sheldonian, with its fantastic fence of heads.

Oxford students and faculty needed Blackwell's books, and his shop became an instant success.  He was very keen about not bothering customers; he wanted them to come in and read whatever they wanted – hoping they would buy something, but not requiring it.  Even today, students can come in the store and take a book off the shelf and use it for their paper, then put it back.  They can even take the books to the coffee shop inside the store.

Over the years, the store expanded to cover a whole row of shops along the Broad Street.  The row is interrupted in only one place – by a pub, the White Horse – which would not sell its property to Blackwells. 

After Benjamin was up in years, his son Basil took over the store.  Basil Blackwell was quite a character.  They called him “the gaffer” (i.e. “boss”), and his office was call “The Gaffer’s Room.”  We got to see it on the tour. Still looks pretty much like it did back in the day – with aqua-colored William Morris wallpaper, flower-print cream curtains and Basil’s pipe on the desk. Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera with me the day of the tour or I'd have taken pictures of the room.



Fireplace outside "The Gaffer's Room;" portrait of Benjamin Blackwell (center) and Basil Blackwell (right)

Around 1917, Basil’s secretary was none other than Dorothy L. Sayers, later famous for her crime novels featuring Lord Peter Wimsey (regret to say I have not delved into any of these – yet).  For info on these novels see  http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A2715365 .  A lot of other people were associated with the shop including Tolkein, A.A. Milne, Cecil Day-Lewis (Daniel’s father), and ….

After the tour, I wandered around the store for about a half hour; it’s about 4 stories tall.  On the top floor were the used books.  I saw a children’s book by James Dickey that tempted me, but I resisted.  Next time we have a really rainy dreary day in Oxford, I think I’ll come back to Blackwells and spend the afternoon browsing through this fabulous bookstore!