The lineup was backed up from the door well into the parking lot on Saturday morning as excited readers awaited the start of the 2019 Museum Book Sale.
The Museum at Campbell River holds the annual event each March to fundraise for its educational programs and services. Membership and Promotions Coordinator Erika Anderson says this year’s book sale, while not record-breaking, was another example of how the community comes out in droves to get their hands on reading material in support of the facility.
“I think its become a community event that people expect to come to every March, and it’s been great that the support has been growing every year,” Anderson says, but adds they couldn’t welcome the huge numbers of excited book lovers without books to put on the table and volunteers to organize and oversee the event.
“I’d really like to thank the community for consistently donating so many books so we can put on the event year after year and the volunteers who come and help out over the course of two days keeping things organized and manageable,” she says.
The book sale is one of the facility’s two major fundraisers of the year – the other being the Festival of Trees which takes place each December, where local businesses and community organizations decorate and fill the main gallery with Christmas trees – and helps them continue offering all of the programs and services on their extremely full calendar.
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“As a non-profit organization, we’re really dependent on fundraisers like this to support the things we do – our exhibits and programming and school programs and the other things we do within the community,” Anderson says. “And it’s great that the community clearly understands that and is more than happy to help us out.”
This year’s event, Anderson says, raised just under last year’s record breaking total of $9,300 for the museum, which she jokingly calls, “not too shabby.”
“It definitely gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling to know that 1,200 Campbell Riverites went home from the museum over the course of the weekend excited about reading.”
For more on the museum and its community programming, visit crmuseum.ca