...Of stains and famous authors

The walls are all painted now, leaving just the display window areas and a few other trim pieces to do. My dad was kind enough to come in today and help me stain bookcases -- three are done, ten more to go. The irony is that while I was removing stains by painting over them (the walls were filthy!), my dad was staining perfectly clean wood on the other side of the shop. Ha!

The bookcases are going to need two coats of stain each, and then they need to be sealed. I think I'm going to switch to paint for the half-stacks that are going down the center of the room, because this is nuts! However, the wall cases really need to be stained for the right look, so... onward.

... come to think of it, switching to a water-based stain for the last 10 tall cases would make sense, too. Phew!

While we were working, a gentleman came in to see what was happening, and to comment on the bookshop idea by remarking that Erskine Caldwell had run a bookshop across the street. Sure enough, when I went home to research it, there was the info. According to Conversations with Erskine Caldwell by Edwin T. Arnold, in 1928, Erskine Caldwell and his wife, photographer Margaret Bourke-White, opened the Longfellow Square Bookshop at 666A Congress Street which he ran through the 1930s (pg 89). Erskine was inspired by Maine when he wrote God's Little Acre (he also wrote Tobacco Road). Today, an architect's offices reside at 666 Congress Street.

More on Erskine Caldwell on Wikipedia (photo source).