You never know what you’ll find in a bargain bin at your local bookstore. One woman dove in looking for something in the late 1990s and ended up much richer more than two decades later.
The Scottish woman, who was not identified, found a first edition of “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” in the bargain bin at a book store in Ullapool in the Scottish highlands in the late 1990s, the BBC reported.
She knew it would be something, recognizing J.K. Rowling’s name from a newspaper article in The Scotsman that she had read.
The Scotsman review in 1997 read, “If you buy or borrow nothing else this summer for the young readers in your family, you must get hold of a copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone by JK Rowley,” misspelling the author’s last name in the article.
Her kids ended up reading it at bedtime over the course of their family trip, CBS News reported.
After the adventure, the family took the book home and kept it, appropriately enough in a cupboard under the stairs, the BBC said.
‘Fantastically well-preserved’ ultra-rare first edition copy of Harry Potter sells @HansonsAuctions … https://t.co/AxuX1Sqcnc #hansons #TalkwalkerAlerts via @talkwalker
— Hansons 🇭 (@HansonsUK) December 12, 2023
Eventually, experts at Hansons Auctioneers determined that the book wasn’t any typical “Harry Potter” book that sits on thousands of bookshelves. Instead, it was one of only 200 copies that were sent to shops during the first print run.
CBS News reported that the first printing had 500 total copies, 200 went to bookshops, while another 300 went to schools and libraries.
The recommended price for the novel was £10, or about £22.44 in today’s money. That is equal to about $28, the BBC reported. The woman even got the price lowered because the dust jacket was not there.
It went on the auction block recently, selling for £55,104, or $69,149, to a private buyer.
“It’s a great result for a great find,” book expert Jim Spencer told the BBC. “This was a genuine, honest first issue and fantastically well-preserved example.”
Spencer has been part of the discovery of 19 of the original 500 copies, Scripps News reported.
“It’s astonishing it ended up on a remote Scottish peninsula, and it was all down to an article in The Scotsman — and perhaps a dusting of magic — that encouraged the inquisitive and very lucky buyer to pluck it from the bargain bin,” Spencer said.
Hansons Auctions called the book the “holy grail” for collectors, and the auctioned edition was one of the most rare and most prized versions, the BBC reported.
As for the missing dust jacket, the woman found out that her thoughts of the book being worthless because of not having the wrap on it were wrong.
“Some time later I learned the book was never released with a dust jacket,” she said according to CBS News.
Eventually, the book was printed for the masses, with an initial printing of 50,000 copies by Scholastic in the U.S. in 1998 under the title, “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone,” CBS News reported.
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