The renowned bookstore founded in Archer City by award-winning “Lonesome Dove” author Larry McMurtry has been closed for over two years, but Booked Up is getting a new life as a literary center.
Chip and Joanna Gaines sold the late writer’s bookstore to the Archer City Writers Workshop, according to a media release.
“We are great admirers of the life and work of Larry McMurtry and look forward to seeing his remarkable bookstore open its doors again in a way that honors his legacy and our shared love for the story and spirit of Archer City,” Chip and Joanna Gaines said in the media release.
The nonprofit writers workshop plans to transform the bookstore into The Larry McMurtry Literary Center.
The ACWW is focused on creating a thriving literary center showcasing “Larry McMurtry’s epic life as a cowboy, novelist, screenwriter, rare book collector and artist for the ages,” the media release said.
In addition, the nonprofit plans to make the author’s collection of 175,000 rare books publicly accessible.
ACWW leaders were convinced Booked Up would be an ideal location for a literary center operated in McMurtry’s honor long before the home goods and remodeling power couple offered the group the chance to buy it.
“Booked Up was the center of Larry’s literary universe and for the hundreds of writers who participated in the Archer City Writers Workshop over the last two decades,” George Getschow, director of the ACWW, said in the media release.
The writers group is grateful to the Gaines for the opportunity to establish a literary center in Booked Up — “a renowned cultural landmark and one of Texas’ and the nation’s literary treasures,” Getschow said.
About a dozen prominent literary centers in the U.S. honor famous authors, including John Steinbeck in Salinas, California; Pat Conroy in Beaufort, South Carolina; and Emily Dickinson in Amherst, Massachusetts, the media release said.
Over the last decade, these centers have become commercially significant, attracting literary tourism and enriching communities.
For example, Willa Cather’s literary center in Red Cloud, Nebraska — population 948 — opened in 2017 and welcomes 8,000-10,000 visitors each year from about 40 states and five countries.
Even though Booked Up is closed, McMurtry’s fans from around the world still flock to Archer City — population 1,637 — in hopes of spotting McMurtry inside his bookstore.
“They come to town hoping to see Larry and his rare book collection,” Dotty Hudson, proprietor of the Spur Hotel, said in the media release, “not realizing that Larry’s gone and his bookstore shutdown.”
Larry McMurtry died in March 2021 at the age of 84.
Like many in Archer City, Hudson believes once the Larry McMurtry Literary Center opens, it will attract McMurtry buffs from the U.S. and overseas, providing a much-needed economic boost to Archer City and the surrounding region.
Perhaps no one in Archer City is more delighted about the coming rebirth of Booked Up than McMurtry’s brother Charlie and his sisters, Sue Deen and Judith McLemore. They all serve on the literary center’s honorary board.
“This is so exciting,” Deen, who managed Larry’s bookstore for seven years, told a gaggle of writers standing outside Booked Up a few weeks ago.
“For Larry, Booked Up was a sacred place,” she said in the media release. “He even got married inside the store. Now we can all celebrate Booked Up’s rebirth into a literary center in Larry’s honor.”
More: Chip and Joanna Gaines company acquires McMurtry’s bookstores in Archer City
More: Local writers among contributors to new book on Larry McMurtry
Trish Choate is the interim editor for the Wichita Falls Times Record News, San Angelo Standard-Times and Abilene Reporter-News. Contact Trish with news tips at tchoate@gannett.com. Read her recent work here. Her X handle is @Trishapedia.
This article originally appeared on Wichita Falls Times Record News: Iconic bookstore founded by Larry McMurty sold to nonprofit
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