Book bricked in a fireplace for 150 years returns to Australian library, late fee would've been nearly $20,000
A book that vanished from an Australian public library roughly 150 years ago has finally been returned, after spending decades sealed inside a bricked-up fireplace
A book that vanished from an Australian public library roughly 150 years ago has finally been returned, after spending decades sealed inside a bricked-up fireplace, according to a report by news agency AP. The book, discovered during a recent home renovation, arrived back at its original library encrusted with water damage from years of confinement — a homecoming so delayed that the librarian involved called it unlike anything she had encountered before. The book, titled "Antiquities of Athens" and first published in 1858, was returned last week to the public library in Kiama, a coastal town in Australia, by local resident Ross Simmons. According to Kiama Library manager Michelle Hudson, Simmons had stumbled upon the volume tucked inside a tea crate that had been sealed within a fireplace during recent renovation work at his home. "We've never had anything that old come back to us," Ms Hudson was quoted as saying on Thursday. She added that while libraries occasionally receive decades-old returns when people clear out deceased relatives' estates, nothing had come close to this in terms of age, based on her experience following library communities on social media.
Speaking to AP on Friday, Simmons said he believed the book had originally been borrowed by his great-great-grandfather, John Simmons, who had once lived in the very house where the book was later found hidden away. "I'm making an assumption. He was in residence in the cottage around about that time and his children were probably too young," Simmons said, referring to his ancestor's likely connection to the missing book. Late Fee Would Have Touched Nearly $20,000 According to the report, the Kiama library first opened its doors in 1872, and the recovered book had been catalogued as No. 506 in the library's original collection, which comprised close to 1,000 titles at the time. Ms Hudson believes the book likely disappeared from the collection within just a few years of the library's opening. Using the original late-fee structure printed inside the book's cover — a British three pence per week overdue charge — Ms Hudson calculated that, adjusted for inflation, the fine for such a lengthy delay would amount to roughly 28,000 Australian dollars, or close to $19,500.
However, she clarified that the library has no intention of pursuing any such payment. Despite the eye-watering hypothetical fine, the identity of the original borrower may never be known. Ms Hudson explained that the library's records from the 1870s documenting who had borrowed which books have long since been lost. "Unfortunately, we have a missing link. There's nothing in the book that tells us who the last borrower was," she said. Also Read | Elon Musk rejects report of Tesla’s China business split plans Interestingly, library regulations from that era required borrowers to return any outstanding book and clear their overdue dues before being permitted to borrow another. Ms Hudson speculated that this rule may explain why the book was never brought back in the first place. "Maybe that's why they never returned it to us," she said. The report also highlighted some of the unusual borrowing rules that governed the library during the 1870s. Households were allowed to borrow up to three books at a time, but only if at least six members of that household were confirmed to be able to read — a stipulation that has no equivalent under today's library norms, which require no such proof of literacy.
The BriefWire