Will Higgins

will.higgins@indystar.com

It's crunch time for the city's oldest and likely funkiest used-book store.

"I'm right up at the edge," said Michael Stafford, the 54-year-old proprietor of Books Unlimited in the Garfield Park neighborhood, noting he's way behind on his rent and has for months tried to sell the business.

With no offers close to his $10,000 asking price, Stafford, who does not watch TV and remains wary of the digital age — "Where's our utopia computers promised?" — plans to hang on to the bookstore as long as possible, or at least for another few weeks in hopes of a Christmas miracle.

Stafford hopes word of mouth will drive foot traffic sufficient to move a good chunk of his merchandise, which includes chess sets, pocket knives, sunglasses and, of course, old books. Thousands are packed into floor-to-ceiling shelves. Most have stood the test of time, such as the compilation of poetry by early-19th century Romantic John Keats, while a few haven't, such as "Fatherhood," by Bill Cosby.

The other day, Stafford did something that suggests he harbors some optimism. He bought 50 sci-fi paperbacks at an estate auction. "Well, it would be defeatist not to have," he said as he sorted them from behind his counter. The counter was cluttered not only with books but with wristwatches, doll furniture and small cat figurines made of glass.

"This is more than books here," he said, referring now not to science fiction and glass cats, etc., but, perhaps, to his life's purpose. "I'm selling some reality in this crazy world. I'm selling culture."

The culture at Books Unlimited is organized rather loosely. As you walk in, it's nonfiction on your right, fiction on your left. Some books are stacked on the floor. Stafford hasn't taken inventory lately but estimates he has 10,000 books in stock, maybe 12,000. Their authors vary widely: Jane Austen, Ernest Hemingway, Mary Shelley, Bill Bryson, Tom Wolfe, Edgar Rice Burroughs, who wrote the Tarzan stories, and Earl Derr Biggers, the creator of Charlie Chan.

Their topics vary widely, too: art, railways, cooking, World War II, religion, American history, Indianapolis literature, denim.

Books Unlimited was started by Stafford's stepfather, Jim Ware, in 1978. For its first 33 years, it occupied a tiny building on East Washington Street across from a Hardee's and in the shadow of the I-65 overpass. Angie's List's expansion four years ago pushed the store to relocate. Ware wanted to move to Fountain Square but couldn't afford it. He could afford the 2600 block of South Shelby Street in Garfield Park.

Evan Finch, a 52-year-old advertising copywriter and occasional used book buyer, liked the old store better. "The new location has better lighting and is more spread out, and you can see the books better," Finch said, "but I liked that the other (location) was just crammed with stuff. You went in there and you had a chance of discovery. It felt like entering the tomb of Tutankhamen — 'Things, wonderful things.'"

"People liked it for its cave appeal," Stafford said, "but to work in there day in, day out, it wasn't that great. It was hot in the summer and cold in the winter. And the bugs."

The current location has "good frontage on Shelby Street," said Ware, who at 82 is retired from the store and travels the country competing in senior track and field events, "but you're competing with the garage sales. That's a heavy garage sale area."

Garfield Park on the south side has struggled for decades. A stone's throw from Books Unlimited are several vacant houses. Across the street is a soup kitchen. But buoyed by the arrival last year of Big Car Collaborative, the nonprofit arts and community building organization, and by a newfound vibrancy in nearby Fountain Square, Garfield Park is generating buzz and getting looks from people "interested in things like books and cultural spaces like bookstores," said Jim Walker, Big Car's founder and CEO. A couple of years ago, an independent coffee shop opened next door to the bookstore, replacing a bar that Stafford said "smelled like beer and puke."

Walker is trying to help Books Unlimited by promoting a gofundme page. It's unusual for a for-profit business to take donations but not unprecedented, especially if it's old and beloved. Last year, patrons of the Red Key raised about $14,000 for a new neon sign for the iconic SoBro tavern. But Books Unlimited's plea, for $10,000, has so far generated just $440.

"Well, I hope (Books Unlimited) survives," said Finch, who has purchased from Books Unlimited over the years, including old Shortridge High School yearbooks and three copies of a book of poetry by Mike Ahern. Ahern was a longtime anchorman with WISH-8. Finch kept one copy and gave the others as gifts. "Ahern put it out in '74; the poetry is not bad," Finch said. "I can't imagine a newscaster doing that these days."

In this age of eBay and Amazon, some used-book stores have succeeded by hedging their bets. Bookmamas in Irvington since 2014 has split its space, and the rent, with a record store, Irvington Vinyl. Books and Brews, with locations in Castleton and Zionsville, doubles as a microbrewery (it has a cream ale called Cream and Punishment).

Books Unlimited's diversification seems a bit less studied. Among the side items available for purchase: movie DVDs, Zippo lighters, an electric typewriter (needs new ribbon), those glass cats, stationery purported to have belonged to James Whitcomb Riley and a reel-to-reel tape of Jimi Hendrix's "Band of Gypsys."

The randomness is what Molly Cummings, a 30-year-old athletics coach, likes about the store. She visited for the first time Tuesday, looking for Tom Robbins novels. (It was Robbins who said: "Humanity has advanced, when it has advanced, not because it has been sober, responsible, and cautious, but because it has been playful, rebellious, and immature.")

She browsed a bit and, finding no Tom Robbins, settled on "10 Books That Screwed up the World," by Benjamin Wiker.

Such is the beauty of Books Unlimited, she was telling Stafford as she checked out. (The book cost $4.) You can go online and find exactly what you are looking for, she said — but where's the "journey" in that? "You come in here and you don't find what you were looking for," she said, "but you find something you didn't expect to find. That's the journey. Not enough people appreciate the journey."

Stafford nodded his approval.

Unless his business improves spectacularly, and right now, Stafford's own journey is about to take a turn. Here is his plan if his enterprise fails, or if a buyer takes it off his hands: "Get a job at Amazon and be some drone."

Call IndyStar reporter Will Higgins at (317) 444-6043. Follow him on Twitter: @WillRHiggins.