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Popular book store to close

Anastasia Books a local favorite for past 31 years

Posted: January 14, 2013 - 12:02am  |  Updated: January 14, 2013 - 12:11am
Signs announce the coming closing of Anastasia Books, a longtime member of St. Augustine's business community.   By ANTHONY DeMATTEO, Special to The Record
By ANTHONY DeMATTEO, Special to The Record
Signs announce the coming closing of Anastasia Books, a longtime member of St. Augustine's business community.

The closing of Anastasia Books, which has operated continuously in St. Augustine for 31 years, might just be a footnote in its biography.

The store, owned by former St. Augustine City Commissioner Sandra Parks, is winding down operations with a progressive sale Parks said will last until about late February.

But though the used books Parks has sold since she stopped selling new education materials in 1987 are being cleared out, the bones of the store off King Street will remain with their owner.

“My store is known for its beautiful interior,” Parks said Sunday as customers entered the store and talked of its closing. “I’m keeping some of the books and the bookcases.”

Parks, the widow of famed civil rights author and champion Stetson Kennedy, said the store had to close because of duties other than those of a bookseller.

Parks is working on writing a book. It would be her 39th published work. She is also leading the transfer of Kennedy’s letters and other writings to the University of Florida, a process she said might take more than two years.

Parks is education chair for the League of Women Voters of Florida and is editing her late husband’s memoirs with Peggy Bulger, former director of the America Folklife Center for the Library of Congress.

“With my writing, my work with the League, Stetson’s memoirs — there was no reasonable way to keep the store open,” she said.

But once her storm of work passes — Parks said she is also collaborating on a documentary and a Hollywood feature film about Kennedy — the book store will likely return.

The store has occupied several locations in town, including its current home in the shadow of the Villa Zorayda, where it moved six years ago.

Parks served as a city commissioner from 1983 to 1987.

Her family’s roots are deep in St. Augustine, including those of her grandfather, Richard L. Parks Sr., who in 1906 wrote the Ponce de Leon March.

She and Kennedy, who in the 1940s infiltrated the Ku Klux Klan to chronicle its movements, met in 2003 on the day her store fully transformed from selling educational materials to used books. They married in 2006.

Kennedy died in the summer of 2011.

“Stetson could walk here from my home, and he did until the end,” she said. “He was so outgoing and loved talking to people. He was very much a part of this store. This was really his little community center for a while.”

Parks said selling used books gave her a chance to facilitate relationships that may not have otherwise existed between authors and readers.

“When you sell used books you give somebody’s mind’s best work another chance of being useful to people,” Parks said.

She said that when her multi-tasking is through, book shoppers can expect her and her store to return somewhere in the city.

“I expect when much of my current work is through, the store will open again,” she said. “It’s more like a pause than a final closing.”

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ricksaunders
501
Points
ricksaunders 01/14/13 - 07:21 am
4
1
What a shame.
Unpublished

Good store. Great service. Thank You for being there as long as you were and I wish you the best!

cattattac
69
Points
cattattac 01/14/13 - 11:01 am
0
1
Wish you well

Sandra: Good luck in all your ventures......Willie Lee Watkins

majoranne
167
Points
majoranne 01/14/13 - 04:52 pm
0
1
Thank you for all your contributions to St. Augustine

Sandra, thank you for the support you give the arts and letters in St. Augustine. I look forward to reading and seeing all your works-in-progress when they come to fruition.

ruiz
1015
Points
ruiz 01/15/13 - 08:16 pm
1
0
sad to see

this indie bookstore close. we're left with homogenized, big box bookstores. they sure don't have the same heart anastasia books did. best wishes!

Gary Galligar
13
Points
Gary Galligar 01/15/13 - 10:30 pm
1
0
Never a good thing

...for small businesses with character to have to close their doors. Hopefully it will be as the article concludes, "a pause and not a final closing."

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