Tales from the Thrift Store

What was your best book find ever at a thrift store? Someone recently found, according to the Telegraph, a first edition of George Orwell's 1984.

Other found stories, care of AbeBooks...


Helter Skelter by Vincent Bugliosi

About 10 years ago in Fresno, California, at a Salvation Army store, I found a signed first edition of Helter Skelter by Vincent Bugliosi, who was the prosecutor in the Charles Manson murders. Inside the book was a fingerprint chart from the FBI. It had a set of fingerprints, Charles Manson's fingerprints, and his signature. This set of prints was old and appeared to be from the time of his trial. They were probably created when he was moved from one facility to another. Whoever owned this book clearly had a sense of justice inserting the prints into the book that detailed Manson’s crimes written by the man who put that monster away. When I was paying the clerk opened the book for a price and saw what I had. She looked at me several times and asked did I see what she was seeing, I replied yes. A small crowd developed as I tried to leave the store.

I held onto this book for years. When a Manson documentary came on TV I would look at the prints and shiver. Eventually I married a wonderful woman who loves to read and discuss books except, of course, ones about Manson. She said the book gave her the creeps and that it was bad Fung Shui to have it in our home. She felt too many people had suffered at the hands of Manson and it wasn’t right to own a piece of him.

I attempted to sell the item and received creepy phone calls from all over the world. In the end I can say that we were successful in ridding ourselves of the book. Our car now has a new set of tires and had a complete tune up that we could not afforded without the book. That’s my book story. I have thousands of others.