William Gowans was a living , breathing young man in a living, breathing young city. After leaving his unexciting hometown of Fredonia, Indiana (USA) in 1825, he made his way to New York. Apparently, he arrived alone without knowing anyone. To survive, Gowans took any job available for an unskilled worker - stone polisher, newspaper folder, stevedore and gardener among others. When he landed a job at a bookstore, however, something changed. His passion for the printed word and entrepreneurial spirit opened up a vision for the future. He would sell books as an independent bookseller..
Less than two years after coming to 'The Big Apple,' Gowans, who had persuaded a small shopowner to allow him to have bookshelves constructed on the outside of the store in exchange for monthly rent, was beginning to make inroads as a self-supporting businessman. Making money, however, was not the source of his new-found happiness. It was what he was selling that gave him the greatest satisfaction. In a letter to his father, Gowans wrote, "The first few books I sold gave me a sensation of Joy not in my power to describe." Beyond a mere commercial transaction, the young man from Indiana had discovered the heart of bookselling - helping someone acquire, apply and share knowledge.
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By the middle of the next decade, Gowans had become an owner and operator of a lucrative business selling books to an emerging middle class. His American dream had come true. While few (if any) booksellers aspired to his level of wealth, most of them possessed the same "Joy." Is not a day spent reading the poetry of (Charles) Baudelaire (1821-1867), the philosophy of (Baruch) Spinoza (1632-1677), the works of the ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes (446-386BCE), the novels of Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1821-1881) and the historical scholarship of Eric Hobsbawm (b. 1917) better than a day devoted to sheer economic survival? For a true bookseller, there is one simple answer.
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Rather than heading to a bookshop for assistance in finding a particular title or asking for a book recommendation, an increasing number of people now search, purchase and read books online. The book, which has bound civilizations together for thousands of years, is rapidly disappearing - as is the bookseller.
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Yet, the bookseller of yesterday remains alive today - alive, remembering shelves that once contained the pages of lives lived - and lives being made. Between those shelves, the pages of life turned and still turn - for once a bookseller, always a bookseller.
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(Photo: The Astor House, New York City. Established as The Park Hotel on Broadway in June 1836, several of its guests probably visited William Gowans' bookshop. Click to enlarge.)
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Key Source
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Stuart M. Blumin, The Emergence of The Middle Class: Social Experience In The American City, 1760-1900 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991).
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J Roquen