Charles O'Donnell, one of the two owners of Dickson Street Bookshop in Fayetteville, Ark., died August 13. He was 85. "With heavy hearts," the bookstore shared his obituary on Facebook, noting: "He will certainly be missed by many.... His memory will live on at the bookshop for all its days, and may they be many."
In 1978, O'Donnell co-founded Dickson Street Bookshop with his partner, Don Choffel. "The shop, as many will tell you, is bigger on the inside than it is on the outside," his obituary noted. "It's a labyrinth of long corridors, containing a hundred thousand worlds, waiting to be cracked open and read, books on any subject you can imagine--used & out-of-print. Charles had a special love for Irish literature and Irish history, and he made sure the shop reflected this deep interest, among others. The bookshop is an extension of his mind and soul, and always will be."
Eoghan O'Donnell told 5News that his father "was working on the bookshop up until the day he passed away. Even though he had oxygen, he was in a walker, he would sit in front of a computer, in front of the books and do work on the bookshop.... He often, even if you had a specific book, he would like to send them to the right section and tell them 'look around' because that's kind of the way to experience an old bookshop."