ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, April 11, 1996 TAG: 9604110001
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 4 EDITION: METRO NOVELIST LARRY
DATELINE: ARCHER CITY, TEXAS
SOURCE: LINDA LEAVELL ASSOCIATED PRESS
Larry McMurtry made his hometown part of the literary landscape when he used it as the backdrop for ``The Last Picture Show.''
Residents may have considered the bleak portrayal of life in fictional Thalia in the mid-1950s an unflattering portrait of their community. But it put the small town 22 miles south of Wichita Falls on the map.
Today, the mark of Archer City's most famous son is still evident.
Around the corner from the crumbling remains of the skinny little movie theater made famous in the movie version of ``The Last Picture Show'' is Booked Up, a store specializing in rare and used books, first editions and out-of-print publications.
``That's what we're there for,'' McMurtry said in a telephone interview from Santa Monica, Calif. ``People can find the books they can't find anywhere else.''
The literary oasis that opened about eight years ago stands out in this dusty, one-Dairy Queen town of about 1,800 people. Booked Up's stock is nearing 300,000 volumes and the store has spread into three jampacked locations, including a former Ford dealership, along Archer City's main street.
In fact, part of the charm is ``having to make this long trek up to this tiny town to see this amazing collection of books,'' said Paula Bosse, who lives in Dallas and whose family has been involved in the book trade for decades.
Being tucked in an out-of-the-way place is not necessarily a detriment in the rare book industry. Much of the work is done by telephone and networking at book shows, so regular foot traffic is not a major concern, employee Mike Murdock said.
However, McMurtry said he envisions Archer City becoming a miniversion of Hay-on-Wye in Wales, a unique little community that earns its living by the sale of secondhand books at dozens of shops. McMurtry hopes to assemble at least 1 million books, which would make visiting Archer City worthwhile for book collectors from overseas.
But even Texans could make the trip to the town 100 miles northwest of Fort Worth, the nearest major city.
``Book lovers will go wherever there are books,'' said McMurtry, who includes himself in that category with some 20,000 books in his stately home that was once Archer City's country club.
The author also offers a more pragmatic explanation for putting his bookstore in Archer City: ``To house a million books, you have to have some cheap real estate.''
McMurtry, 59, said he grew up ``in a bookless region'' of Texas, so part of his motivation in amassing this great collection of books is ensuring that future generations have something he missed as a youth.
Born in Wichita Falls, McMurtry graduated with honors from Archer City High School in 1954, before going on to college and graduate school.
To buy new books while he was in college, he sometimes had to sell old books from his collection and thus began to gain experience as a dealer. While as a graduate student at Stanford University, he worked as a book scout for several San Francisco stores. On his return to Texas in 1965, he became a scout and dealer with a Houston firm.
In 1969, he moved to the Washington area to concentrate on his writing. He opened the first Booked Up in Georgetown 25 years ago with two partners when they found a place that rented for $100 a month.
He opened the Archer City store in 1988 and closed two other Texas locations soon after. Today, another store exists in Tucson, Ariz., and the Washington location is still in operation.
As McMurtry is widely known for ``The Last Picture Show,'' ``Terms of Endearment'' and the Pulitzer Prize-winning ``Lonesome Dove'' among readers, his considerable skills as a bookman appear to be legendary among antiquarian book dealers, several of whom said they knew him well and considered him a friend.
``For anyone to dedicate the amount of effort and time and money ... to restore upon his birthplace this promise of the future is itself a very noble thing,'' said Peter B. Howard, former president of the Antiquarian Book Sellers Association of America and owner of Serendipity Books in Berkeley, Calif.
``He loves being a bookman. The buying, the pricing, the shelving ...,'' said Marcia Carter, a partner in the Washington store. ``This is something he can do forever. He can't write forever.''
McMurtry acquires many books from auctions, estate sales or other dealers. First editions and autographed copies are common.
As shelves are still under construction in what was once the Ford dealership's garage, tens of thousands of books still must be cataloged into history, science fiction, mystery, Texana, cinema and about two dozen other categories.
Antiquarian book sellers emphasize that chain bookstores may carry some of the same works. But places like Booked Up cater to lovers of books, who are willing to pay top dollar for publications based on scarcity, desirability, scholarly purpose or a special interest in the author, for example.
Becoming as knowledgeable as McMurtry about the industry can take decades, Howard said. The booksellers association requires a minimum of four years' experience for membership, which currently numbers 600.
No one goes into the antiquarian book business to become rich, but everyone has a marked respect for the written word, Howard said.
``Hopefully, they'll never come a time when books become so passe that no one has a passion for them,'' Booked Up employee Murdock said. ``That's what we deal with. People who have a passion for the book itself.''
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