Contact: Suzanne Trimel For immediate release

(212) 854-6579 April 28, 1999

smt4@columbia.edu

 

 

New Columbia Bookstore, Largest Ever,

Opens At Broadway and 115th Street

 

Columbia Universityâs new campus bookstore has opened for business at Broadway and 115th Street.

The Columbia University Bookstore, at 19,000 square feet, is Columbiaâs largest ever. Open to the general public, the store is the first tenant in the new Lerner Hall Student Center, which is scheduled to open this coming fall. The store is entered on the ground floor at Broadway and 115th Street.

ãWe welcome this handsome new store, which is an important resource for the entire community and represents another step toward the opening of Columbiaâs magnificent new student center,ä said Columbia President George Rupp.

In addition to textbooks for courses in Columbiaâs undergraduate and graduate professional schools on Morningside Heights, the Columbia University Bookstore carries 65,000 general fiction and non-fiction titles, including African-American history and topics, womenâs and ethnic history, general interest and specialty periodicals, academic journals, writing, desk, and computer supplies, dormitory necessities, and gifts and insignia items, such as sweatshirts and other clothing items with Columbia logos.

A grand opening reception was held on Wednesday, April 28.

Special advertised promotions for the Morningside Heights and Harlem communities are planned. The bookstore is on the Barnes and Noble authorsâ tour schedule for readings and book signings, said bookstore manager Kevin Renshaw. On April 27, Mary Frances Berry, chairwoman of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, read from her new book, ãThe Pig Farmerâs Daughter and Other Tales of American Justice.ä A reading is planned for early May by Mike Wallace, author with Edwin G. Burrows of the 1999 Pulitzer Prize winner for history, ãGotham: A History of New York City to 1898.ä

Columbiaâs unique academic legacy is highlighted through the bookstoreâs stock of important campus authors, past and present, and books published by Columbia University Press. Special displays are planned during the academic year featuring the works of noted current faculty authors and former professors. Students and others may satisfy their curiosity about what their professors read for pleasure -- monthly displays will recommend recent books from the personal reading lists of faculty.

In its stock, the bookstore has tried to avoid competition with other booksellers on Broadway and locations nearby on Morningside Heights. The store will not stock childrenâs or education-related books, so as not to compete with the Bank Street or Teachers College bookstores. Likewise, it will not stock a full line of scholarly texts, leaving that market to the Labyrinth Bookstore further south on Broadway.

The bookstore will be open now through the summer 9 A.M.-7 P.M. Monday through Thursday, 9 A.M.- 5 P.M. Friday and 11 A.M.-6 P.M. on the weekend. In the fall, the hours will be 9 A.M.-9 P.M. Monday through Friday and 11 A.M.-7 P.M. on the weekend. The telephone is 854-4131.

This document is available at http://www.columbia.edu/cu/pr/.

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