Bowman Rare Book Collection Dedication held at WCC

l-r: Angela Roten, Dr. Jeff Cox, Arnold Lakey, Bumgarner, Tom Bowman, Karolen Bowman, Allison Phillips, Mike Wingler, and Christy Earp.

A dedication ceremony was held on Thursday, December 10, 2020, for the Bowman Rare Book Collection housed in the Pardue Library at Wilkes Community College (WCC). Due to the current COVID-19 restrictions which limit the number of individuals for inside spaces, the ceremony was filmed and is available on WCC’s YouTube channel.

The Bowman Rare Book Collection houses approximately 8,000 titles from the private collection of Dr. Tom Bowman. Primarily consisting of first, early, and important editions of popular serial fiction titles for adolescent boys and girls, the collection includes works by American and British authors that span the late-19th to mid-20th century, an era considered by many to be the golden age of children’s publishing. The titles in this collection established such iconic characters as Tom Swift, The Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, and Tarzan. Writers like Horatio Alger, Jr. introduced readers to exciting careers and encouraged them to pursue the American Dream. Other series in this collection allows readers to immerse themselves in a variety of adventures, from camping with the Boy Scouts to serving in the armed forces during the First World War, to taking th