Better very late than never.
A book that had been checked out of a library in Shreveport, La. — 84 years ago — was recently returned to startled librarians.
The prodigal book, a slightly battered, 1915 edition of Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters, was found, and returned, by an unnamed man who’d been cleaning out his mother’s house, according to staff at the Shreve Memorial Library.
His mother had checked it out when she was just eleven years old, and the accompanying library card was stamped “Due April 14, 1934.”
“Five cents a day is charged for each book kept overtime,” a card-holder glued into the book instructs.
At that rate, a fine of more than $1,500 would be owed, the Shreveport Times reported.
But the library’s current maximum fine is $3. And even that amount was waived, the paper reported.
Photos of the book were posted recently to the library’s Facebook page, along with a note written by the librarian who accepted it earlier this week.
“Patron’s mother checked out book in 1934, when she was 11 years old,” the note read.
“Patron found it when cleaning out the house & returned to Main [library] 10/1/2018.”
Even though it’s a first edition, it’s in “pretty rough shape,” so probably not worth much, a library staffer told the Associated Press.
“Spoon River Anthology” is a book of free verse by Edgar Lee Masters, with each poem written from the viewpoint of a dead person in the imaginary town.
“We thought that the title was appropriately spooky to turn up again after all this time right around Halloween,” the library posted on Facebook.
When a Facebook user asked what would happen to the book now, a staffer responded that it will remain out of circulation.
“The binding is loose and it is an old book, so it has been decommissioned,” the staffer wrote.
The library still charges just five cents a day for overdue books.
With Post wires