Original Blog Entry: $9000 fine library book returned after 110 years

truesee — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 23:51:28 GMT

April 12, 2009

Book returned after 110 years

By THE CANADIAN PRESS

BROCKVILLE -- An overdue library book with a storied past has been returned to its home 110 years late.

Though the book's fine would total more than $9,000, the 83-year-old American who returned it to a museum south of Ottawa last week isn't being forced to pay up.

Dale Fenton Baird, of Denver, handed the 12-cm thick Webster's Dictionary over to Lyn Heritage Place Museum.

His great uncle Mutt borrowed the book from Lyn Public Library in 1899. The entire Baird family moved from the village of Lyn to New York state later that year.

The leather-bound book was still in good condition despite having once been pulled across an ice-covered St. Lawrence River on a skid.

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