A borrower returned a library book almost 37 years late with an interesting note tucked inside, leaving library staff amused and bemused.
On March 13th, the borrower anonymously returned the book to the Riverside Library and Cultural Center in Weld County, Colorado. The book in question was “Psychedelics” by Bernard Aaronson and Humphry Osmond, published in 1970. It ended up in the hands of the library’s materials manager, who was “a little puzzled” to discover that the return was 36 years, 9 months, and 13 days overdue.
“It had a stamp on it that said Weld County Library, a name we haven’t used since 1985,” said James Melena, Community Relations and Marketing Manager of the High Plains Library District, in an interview with The Epoch Times.
A sticky note in the book read, “Sorry it’s so late! It’s been a long, strange trip.” It was accompanied by a doodle of a smiley face.
Library staff found it “quite funny” and jokingly posted on Facebook, “We would never suggest that a book about psychedelics might alter one’s perception of time…”
Melena speculated that the borrower probably found it amusing, just like they did.
The story went viral on the internet the day after it was posted on Facebook. None of the library staff expected their fun discovery to gain such attention. Even employees who had been working in the region for decades couldn’t recall a book being returned so late. The latest overdue book in their current system dated back to 2017.
“From analog to digital management, we’ve lost a lot of inactive account information. We clear out inactive accounts every 10 years, so we really don’t have good records on what the oldest overdue book might be,” Melena told The Epoch Times, “but this book is definitely the longest overdue!”
He explained that the library had no way of identifying the borrower, as the last time the book was borrowed was in 1987, when the library was still using card catalogs.
The return of the book means that the library will not collect any late fees. However, Melena calculated that at 10 cents per day, the overdue fines for this book would have amounted to “over $1300.”
Melena believes that the return of this book also offers an interesting comparison between the culture of the 1970s and modern culture since the book was classified as a “young adult” book.
“If you crack open this book and read a little bit, even just one or two minutes, you realize it’s college-level psychology,” he said, “When we think of young people today, we think of books like ‘The Hunger Games’, so it might really show a hallmark of the era, that the term ‘young adult’ had a broader sense or meant very different things at that time.”
Melena also has a theory on why this long-overdue book and its amusing apology letter attracted so much attention from internet users.
“I think many people have had experiences of not returning a book on time… The story of this book might make them feel a little better about themselves!” he said.