THE

HE Community, Book Shop, Miami, Fla., as it stands, today with a stock on its shelves, inventoried, around $18,000, is, the result of, a distinct community need, and $1,500.

It originally, started; three years ago, as the Studio Book Shop, in connection, with its owner's, Natalie Newell's Studio of Architectural Rendering and Commercial Art, mostly as a library proposition of the latest fiction, and popular generalbooks, which could. be purchased or borrowed,, as the case might be. The Shop, and Studio were upstairs in the Columbia Building, a little off the beaten path of the general public, but as there was no other exclusive bookshop or library, other than the department stores, and the Women's Club, respectively, the plunge was made without the faintest dream of where it would lead.

The rooms grew smaller and the stock grew larger.. The Studio Book Shop began to open accounts with the individual publishers, and the demand was so great that negotiations for the shop on the main floor at the entrance of the same building were put forward, and the next winter saw the bookshop ensconsed in the new quarters. and carrying an increased stock of $5,000. This meant, of course, increased overhead, but the popularity of the bookshop was more than worth it, for the third year found this ground floor shop too small and an opportunity presented itself for a shop on Flagler Street. Small, and in a delapidated old frame building, but on the best corner in town.

As stated before, it is the result of $1,500. Miss Newell was the proud possessor of $1,000 and Marjory Stoneman Douglas $500, SO they got their heads together, and both being capable judges of books and authors, ordered, from Baker and Taylor to the full amour.t of their capital enough books, as they thought to last all the winter season. When they came in three large crates, they wondered if Baker and Taylor had any books left in their stock, and what on earth they were going to do with them all.

This investment required action, so they invented a system of advertising which caught the public eye, in the form of a series of book news cartoons, one inch high and seven columns wide, across the bottom

Needless to say, they took another plunge, incorporating the Studio Book Shop into the Community Book Shops, Shop No. 1, in view to a chain of shops thruout the South.

The new shop is at 113 E. Flagler Street, and is only ten feet wide by fifty feet deep.

A sketch by Miss Newell printed on this page shows the very practical and attractive shelf arrangement. The unequal spacing is charming and practical and gives a place for very tall and very short books. The

drawers below the low shelf-like seat hold the gift books. The side lighting has a homey effect under the shingle roof which is not only ornamental but acts as a dust catcher. Along the seat at intervals are five or six new books in attractive book-ends. "It is a sort of cafeteria affair," writes Miss Newell, "and lots of time is saved in rush hours by people helping themselves. We We cannot do much with this building, as it is the oldest one in town, and the owners threaten to tear it down and build a new one, every year. We have, however, an option on the new shop when built, so that this is our permanent location."

MIAMI'S ATTRACTIVE BOOK WINDOW

It is lined from floor to high ceiling with books of every description, but caters especially to popular new books, as the trade here is that of a resort town, and is practically a three months' one. The people who come down read to be amused, or to know what is being discussed, and altho Miami is growing to be an all year round town, the demand for large home libraries is not great at the present time. The Miami people are grateful for the fact that the shop stays open all the year, but with the over-head carried the summer months are not what one might call profitable, but the climatic conditions are such during the

rainy season and some months in the spring, that if books were left in a closed shop they would accumulate the best crop of mildew ever seen in the state of Florida.

The above all sounds like a race to wealth, but so far, of necessity, everything has been turned back into accumulating our stock, and this year has just brought it to where it will stand for a while and some cash profits will be realized.

There are two big handicaps in a shop in Miami, one, and especially as in this case, when it was started with so little capital, is the fact that all the trade centers in three months, January, February and March (the Christmas trade is good, for a local one, of a town of 40,000 people, but it does not eat a hole in the stock) and the other is the high cost of getting books down here. By express ordinary sized books cost from 15 cents to 20 cents apiece; by freight, if sent by boat, about half that, but freight by rail, when it hits the wellknown Florida East Coast Railway is a load on the debit side of the books. Fortunately most of the books come from New York or Boston, so that the boats can be used to advantage.

This is the history of the Community Book Shops, Inc., to date. They are still trying to catch up with themselves, and when they do, just watch their chain!

There do not seem to be people in Miami, interested enough to buy the corporation stock to give a working capital for this chain. This is probably due to the immense profits everyone is making in real estate, if he has any money to invest. So the owners of the Community Book Shops are just working their heads off alone, for they see a big future.

As to Miami as a book center for new books, there were 85,000 tourists there last winter, all of whom are potential book buyers and they are making room for twice as many this next season. If only 10 per cent of those people buy one book to read on the train going home, figure it out for yourself, the amount of books that will be distributed from Miami alone. Let the best publisher win.

Book Shop Prize Awarded

MIS

ISS ELIZABETH BANKS was announced this week as the winner of the Better Book Shops contest conducted by the Doubleday Page Book Shop Company. Robert S. Lynd, formerly of the Publishers Weekly, second prize, $100 in books, while the third prize, $50 in books, won by Wendell S. Hill of Washington, D. C. Ten prizes of $10 in books also were awarded.

3.

IN THE COMPOSING ROOM OF A MODERN BOOK-MAKING PLANT. THE TYPE IS BEING LOCKED UP READY FOR THE PRESS.

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4.

E have heard much about the conflict between movies and books, but little about their cooperation. Ginn and Company, educational publishers, have recently shown one way of combining the use of motion pictures with the production of books. Thru Rowland Rogers, of the Picture Service Corporation, who has had an unusually wide experience with educational films, Ginn and Company have just produced. "Your Book," a two-reel picture showing the evolution of the book from its earliest forms to the modern book produced at the Athenaeum Press in Cambridge.

The picture contains much that will interest all who have. anything to do with books. Specimens of books of other lands and ages, obtained from the collection of

Dr. David Eugene Smith and George A. Plimpton of New York, were photographed in studio and outdoor scenes in settings of the countries in which they originated. First are shown scenes of a Babylonian schoolboy doing his sums on a clay tablet, and of boys and books of ancient Egypt, Arabia, Palestine, India, and Persia; then a view of a monk of the Middle Ages copying a book on parchment, followed by a reproduction in full colors of a picture from a prayer book of the fifteenth century. A glimpse of the Gutenberg Bible is followed by a picture of one of the only two known pages from the first schoolbook made from movable types, also printed by Gutenberg. A hornbook and the New England Primer are pictured in the hands of children of

the days when these books were commonly used.

To represent the preparation of the manuscripts of modern educational books, views are given of Wallace W. Atwood, author of geographies; Otis W. Caldwell, Principal of the Lincoln School; David Saville Muzzey and James Harvey Robinson, the historians; and David Eugene Smith, author of many works in mathematics.

At the Athenaeum Press, where Ginn and Company produce all of their publications, the modern method of making books is shown. Here the observer is given intimate views of the different processes rather than extended pictures of the plant itself (the capacity of which is about as large as that of any book-making plant in America). Following the manufacturing scenes is an animated picture showing the different parts of a book, with the name of each, and the positions of these parts when assembled. The right and wrong ways of opening a book are explained, and, for the warning of the young people who will see the picture, there is a series of views showing how books should not be used.

When taking the pictures at the Athenaeum Press last June, Mr. Rogers and three assistants, a camera man, a make-up man, and an electrician, devoted an entire week to the photography. Operatives who appear prominently in the pictures were made up much as are the actors and actresses.

"Your Book" is not Ginn and Company's first venture in motion pictures. In 1915 a one-reel picture was made at the Athenaeum Press for display at the PanamaPacific Exposition. Since then it has been circulated for showings mainly among schools. In the course of the last seven or eight years the art of making motion pictures has advanced so rapidly and so many changes have been made at the Athenaeum Press that the question of withdrawing the film from circulation was seriously considered. But as the demand for it seemed to grow rather than to diminish, it was finally decided to make an entirely new picture.

The results of Mr. Rogers' work on the new motion picture are unusually good. It has been made so that it will have a wider appeal than the other picture. Its distribution will be handled thru Mr. Rogers (of the Picture Service Corporation, 71 West 23rd Street, New York City). Already it has been booked for display before librarians, teachers, booksellers, and chambers of commerce, as well as in colleges and schools in many parts of the country.

Brentano's

RALPH B. HENRY

Carson, Pirie, Scott & Co.
A. KROCH

Kroch's Bookstore
FRANK M. MORRIS

Morris Bookshop
THERON P. COOPER
Waldon Bookshop
MARCELLA BURNS HAHNER
Marshall Field Co.
FANNY BUTCHER

Fanny Butcher's Shop
ENTERTAINMENT

Chairman-L. B. VAUGHAN

F. J. Drake Co.
F. K. REILLY
Reilly & Lee Co.
W. P. BLESSING

W. P. Blessing Co,
G. W. LITTLEJOHN
Rand-McNally Co.
DONALD P. BEAN

University of Chicago Press

F. H. TRACHT

U. of Chicago Bookstore

MEMBERSHIP COMMITTEE Chairman, STANLEY REMINGTON Norman Remington Co., Baltimore, Md.

The bulletin just mailed to members says:

"Our next convention, for many reasons, should be the greatest convention we have ever held. First, it is our twenty-fifth convention and thus rounds out a quarter century of Association effort. Second, being held in Chicago, it becomes convenient for booksellers from all points of the compass to attend. Third, your convention committees have all been appointed and are even now at work. The program as tentatively outlined promises to be the most constructive we have ever had. If every bookseller will consider its success dependent upon his being there it will be our greatest convention."