CH 5 Pt. II : ANOTHER OVERDUE LIBRARY BOOK

The story of the book on the South African WW II air-ace, Sailor Malan, reminded Stephen Mullineux that he's also been in possession of a school library book on long loan for the past 40 years. It's one borrowed from the 'adult' section of the library (I didn't know there was one!), the previously banned "Lady Chatterley's Lover".

The school has declined to take it back, denying that such a book was ever part of its collection, but the proof is there and it even bears the date stamp on which the book was borrowed as you will see from the following photos:




Steve is quite relieved as not only is his conscience now cleared but he also gets to keep the book to which he has become quite attached over the years and which, as a batchelor with a lot of time for reading, has been a source of great pleasure to him.

But, actually if you open the book and try to look for some of the saucy passages underlined in red, a surprise awaits you. Let Steve himself tell the story: :"The book was my copy of "The History of Mr Polly", one of our setwork books. Mike Wade and I converted it to look as it it were a Selborne library book (we were both librarians). I painstakingly made the dust cover, using my dad’s supply of India ink and pens, and in the end it looked fairly realistic. Then came the conversion to look like a library book. I see we date-stamped it to be returned by 30 March 1970."

So the school was right, after all!