Photo and Commentary ©2024 by Maylan Schurch
Friday, January 5, 2024
The day after Christmas Shelley and I paid a visit to the two-story Redmond (WA) Half-price Bookstore. Its shelves are well-stocked with volumes which are mostly used, and sometimes very old. It’s one of our favorite stores.
On my way to the Writing and Reference area on the second floor, I paused to snap a photo of the scene you see above. What struck me was the contrast between the neatly-carpeted staircase and the brick wall. The staircase is functional, but the wall has character.
As you can probably guess, this wall wasn’t built to house a bookstore. A bit of online research about Redmond revealed that this was the first brick building erected in Redmond, back in 1908. It originally housed the Redmond Trading Company, and has had many tenants since then. (I’ll put the historical link below.)
As you can see, this isn’t fancy brickwork, nor is it the brick veneer which is often applied to a house’s exterior to give it a venerable ambience. These are real, workaday bricks, and the troweling is solid but hasty. It’s as if the owner said, “Hey. We need to plant ourselves solidly in Redmond, because it’s going to grow. We don’t know how long it’ll take, but we have faith!”
Sure enough, if you read the historical note in the link, Redmond grew. It took awhile, and didn’t really start to flourish until the two Lake Washington floating bridges crossed the gap from Seattle, but now it’s booming. (Its hosting of the mammoth Microsoft campus didn’t hurt.) Half-price Books is now dwarfed by tall apartment buildings just to the west, but these brick walls are still standing, and Half-price staffers are still dispensing reading material to a steady stream of customers.
Persistence—sticking with what’s worthwhile—might be a great New Year’s resolution. And the Bible gives wonderful encouragement to those who might feel like giving up. Check out the link just below, and then scroll down and click on the historical link (the reference to the Redmond Trading Company is in the fourth paragraph).
https://www.bibleinfo.com/en/topics/giving-0
https://www.redmondhistoricalsociety.org/redmond-history-overview