Selling technical books in the area
 

I have quite a few engineering books from my previous life that I'm considering selling. I may consider donating some as well. These are primarily mechanical engineering topics like mechanics, stress/strain, fluid flow, heat transfer, thermodynamics, etc. Some specialty subjects like water quality, pressure vessel design, specific material properties, etc.
I would like to let these go locally but not sure where to start. I've talked to the Tuftonboro free library and they said they would take them as donations and then sell (or donate) them themselves. Not sure I want to do that as some of them cost me a pretty penny back in the day. Not looking to make a killing just beer money or gas for the boat.
Anyone have direct experience doing this in the area or a recommendation where to start looking?
TIA
Bob

Donate
 

Donate to a college or university and take the tax credit. Thinking donating to a library.

Dave

Thanks Dave. Might consider that if nothing else develops but colleges have their own curriculum and materials. Lot of study material is online these days. I'll probably consider Craigslist or similar first. I think these may be better suited to a practicing engineer.

I could have been an engineer too if it wasn't for the science and the math....

I could have been an English major if it was not for spelling and grammar:D

Alan
MSEE

Ahhh I remember those books vividly. Sadly I found colleges don’t really want them because each professor is hawking their own version of the book that you have to buy for 299$ on top of everything else.

I have to say some of those books are probably the last books I actually reads I also kept all of mine thinking they would help in the actual work place but i find the info is all on the internet now too. No need to lug heavy books around :emb::laugh::laugh::laugh:

I have a collection of engineering and physics books including classic texts on digital communications theory. I run across them now and then and say that they really need to go. Other than nostalgic value or marveling that once long ago I actually understood the stuff, I think that they are pretty much worthless now. Like old computers, the final stop will probably be the dump.:(

That's "I could have been an English major if it were not for spelling and grammar."

https://www.grammar-monster.com/glos...ctive_mood.htm

[One nerdy thread-drift post begets another:laugh:]

donation?
 

Try donating them to the Huggins Hospital Street Fair in Wolfeboro. Their book tent is huge and popular. I don't know if the fair is running this year due to Covid, but try googling for it. If it runs, it is usually the first Fri and Sat in August, so coming up soon.

answer
 

Sorry. Just looked up the Fair. It is not happening this year. Too bad. It's usually lots of fun.

I sympathize with your problem. I have a collection of such books left over from my past life as a Physics and Chemistry teacher.

Assuming you want to sell them, forget trying to find someone local: too specialized.

You need a national / international audience.

I'd offer them for sale on e-bay.

There may also be other online sites which specialize in text books but I never looked into it.

How the internet has changed nearly everything.

I was an English major, DESPITE spelling and grammar- and a bunch of other crazy stuff no English teacher today would even recognize, let alone understand.

Ever hear of the "Flanders System", or "The Tree of the English Language"?

Didn't think so.

That's OK- frat beer was $.10/16oz.cup/downtown 6-packs of Bud were $1.21- Got to see Taj Mahal (band) for $10.00, in a small gymnasium.

The Street Fair in Wolfeboro does have a barn on Pine Hill Road where they take and store and all sell stuff. I know the fair is cancelled this year but maybe they are still taking items.

This is exactly what I did. Put the ISBN / title on eBay and see what they are selling and/or listed for. From there take a decision if listing is worth your time. In my case I listed and sold 4, donated the other 20.

technical books are a hard sell. they are limited in audience and heavy to ship and generally all available online. I had a bunch a few years ago and finally had to dump them.

Yeah, looking like I need to do an online sale. Started putting an ISBN list together to submit to a few online sellers. One of them, Valorebooks.com, seems to have an easy to use site where you enter the ISBN numbers and they submit a quote. They also claim to pay for shipping. I'll post back how it goes.
Thanks everyone for the replies/advice.

BTW Jeep, I loved Taj Mahal back in the day. Never saw him though. Speaking of gymnasiums, I caught Jethro Tull at the Lowell Tech gymnasium right after the Aqualung release. Really nice because they did a lot of their previous stuff as well. We were sitting cross legged on the floor about 20 ft from Anderson.
Years before that I saw Vanilla Fudge with Orpheus (anyone remember them?) opening for the Fudge at the Lowell State Teachers college gymnasium. Wow, amazing how the long term memory has overridden the short time.

Funny you'd mention that.

The first live rock concert I saw was when I was about 14 or so: Iron Butterfly playing in the gymnasium of a high school.

What a game changer for a suburban white kid.

Cool. Reminds me of a story about the name of their most popular song, In a Gadda da Vida. Doug Ingle, the lead singer, had too much to drink and was in the studio when a sound engineer asked for the title. The intended name of the song was "In the Garden of Eden" but the engineer heard "In a gadda da vida". There are other stories around this like Doug was yawning when he said it but I'm going with the former. Fits better into Rock and Roll culture.

Commodore Hotel- Lowell?
 

Was there such a place as this in the late 60s (it's the name in my head)?

A friend and I went to see Cream. The platform (stage) was so low, you could walk right up to it and be eye-level with Ginger Baker (a thousand cymbals!). Although we knew we were at a great show, we surely didn't realize the greatness before us.

The people were actually on a dance floor dancing to them!!!

BOOKS!
I saved all my major and minor books (English/History) in an old suitcase in a basement. Ten years later it was a 50lb. mass of of sog and mildew!

Iron Butterfly...Life changing experience....
 

When I was 16 and had just got my driver's license (1967), I took two girls and a male friend from the rental cottages next door to get the 8 track Iron Butterfly album in Laconia. We were in my "55 Oldsmobile.

It was a rainy night and In a Gada da Vida was playing loudly. We were heading north on Rt. 3, just south of Kellerhaus. There was a 1950's era brown panel van in front of us with a bunch of little girls waving at us though the back window.

From the north, coming down the hill heading south, was a white Cadillac going too fast and lost control. It slammed into the truck. I was the only other vehicle around. I pulled over and ran to the truck. The father was lying in the road screaming for someone to help his girls (6 of them).

I ran to the passenger side and with horror I'll never forget, the Mom had gone though the windshield and her head had been almost severed but she was alive. As she screamed blood came out the laceration and splattered on the windshield. I wanted to turn and run, and almost did.

In a split second I thought you'll never live with yourself if you run. Do what you gotta do. I told my friend to help the girls and I ran to Kellerhaus and told them to call for help (no 911 then and no cell phones).

When I got back to the car, the girls ad been taken out of the truck and had been put in my car. A cop had arrived and soon one ambulance for 7 people.

The cop saw the 6 girls already in my car and asked if I could drive to the ER behind the ambulance. For a 16 year old kid, who just got his license, to be driving 90 mph down Rt. 3 to LRGH was scary. The little girls sitting next to me, although covered in blood, were relatively OK. They kept asking if their parents were alright. I couldn't cry, but wanted to.

We got to LRGH and the girls were whisked away. They brought Mom in and her throat had already been stitched. She was still alive.

Then they wheeled the drunk driver of the Cadillac in with a cop interrogating him. In the middle of the interrogation the driver turned to the cop and in the middle of saying "FU", I saw him die.

The Abdo family all lived. They were from Manchester, Massachusetts.

A few weeks later I got a call from the Cadillac driver's wife's attorney who said her husband had blamed the accident on a 3rd car before he died.

I told the lawyer she had been lied to. I was the only 3rd car around.

Many months later I got a very nice letter of extraordinary "Thanks" from Mrs. Abdo (I still have it 6' near me now).

A life changing experience I wish had never happened and impossible to forget.

You've got to be kidding me. I was there! My buddy and I were supposed to be going to a dance nearby at a Catholic school (Keith Hall). We were walking past the Commodore Ballroom (on Thorndike st) and looked up to see the billboard advertising "The Cream". Being the rebels we were in those days we decided to pool every cent we had and go in. I was blown away. It was instrumental in forming my music appreciation over the years. We certainly got some looks being in suit coat and ties. Not sure if it was the same night as you though.
Small world.

Wow! Not a memory I would want attached to a favorite song.

Wow Gary! Talk about a life changing experience! Kudos to you for being a very mature 16 year old and saving someones life!

Dan

No go with online book resellers
 

Got quote back on 11 books I submitted as a test to Valorebooks.com.
$0.01. I had to laugh. Next step is Craigslist and E-Bay. After that, maybe fire pit (after a few drinks to ease the pain).

I haven't read the whole thread, but my wife has always used bookbyte to sell her books. She claims it's the best option.

Sent from my SM-G950U using Winnipesaukee Forum mobile app

Thanks Think. I'll check that out tomorrow. Was she selling books she wrote or read?

Read—school books.
Also, I went back to see your note about Keith Hall and Thorndike Street. My mother graduated from KH and both parents lived in that area of Lowell most of their lives.

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I had an old vcr style video camera that cost a pile of money back in the day but I had not used it in years, was not going to use it and no one in their right mind wanted it. tossed it and have never missed it.

Oops, I just realized my mistake after reading your reply. I was going to comment that Keith Hall was an all male school so your mother couldn't have been there when it hit me that it was Keith Academy (all male) that was on Thorndike St. Keith Hall was an all female school on Stevens St. right next to the grade 1-8 St. Margaret's school I went to.
Glad you posted that.

PM sent.

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No go on Bookbyte. Technical specialty not their thing. Going Craigslist next. I might be getting too obsessed with this.

Might be time to put them in the back of a truck and drive down the highway very fast.

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LOL. Hmm. Would I be able to claim a tax credit for the littering fine?

Wow!
 

My friend was from Salem, N.H., so he was familiar with the area- me, had no idea where we were. Funny the right name stuck though!

Yep- small world it can be!

Good luck with the books.

bobkatfly
 

April6, 1968- one date only at the Commodore! It was the third gig of a 19 gig tour- for only April of that year! :eek:

https://www.mvmag.net/2017/01/24/lowell-commodore/

https://www.whereseric.com/eric-clap...r/archive/1968

Great research Jeep. We were lucky locals back then. Although I went to Boston for a lot of concerts, the Commodore was thee place to go if you lived in the area, especially if it was walking distance (I lived maybe 3 or 4 miles away). Of course back then walking distance was anything under 5 miles. I also continued to go there after it became Mr C's.

Exactly
 

You beat me to it. The statement requires a subjunctive as it is contrary to fact. In old NH colloquial the statement would be " ...if twarn't..." (muffled NH 'r'). LOL
In pre-internet days my sister had her own business in DC establishing/maintaining industrial libraries for companies who had dedicated libraries on site. Not so much anymore. If these are textbooks with highlighting and notes in the margins, glue the pages together, cut out the center and sell them as places to hide valuables.

Selling technical books...
 

I sympathize with your efforts to sell the books, and I also sympathize with your reluctance to just throw them away. There is something about a book that keeps me from throwing it away, even if I haven't opened it for years.

However, a couple of years ago I did do just that, threw some away, and, honestly, like jbolty said, I haven't missed them. So, just do it, and have another beer.