Book-seller was 'a decent chap'
 
Bookseller Reginald Russell, whose succession of second- hand bookstores were Montreal institutions for almost half a century, died yesterday morning at the Chateau Westmount retirement home of complications following a stroke.

Bookseller Reginald Russell, whose succession of second- hand bookstores were Montreal institutions for almost half a century, died yesterday morning at the Chateau Westmount retirement home of complications following a stroke.

He was 96.

Until it closed eight years ago, his musty store on St. Antoine St. W. was a book-browsers dream. It housed a vast selection of reasonably priced titles, remaindered bestsellers, as well as rare volumes and first editions.

"He was a decent chap, to use one of his favourite expressions," said Daniel Buda, an antiquarian book dealer who worked for Russell for 10 years.

"He was an old-world gentleman. He never had a bad word to say about anyone. 'He's a decent chap,' - he'd say that about every one. I never heard him yell or lose his temper or ever swear. When he was frustrated, he'd use an old Irish word: 'Gaaar!'

"He had an encyclopedic knowledge of books, their value and why they were valuable. He'd spend hours in his warehouse behind the store to be with his books," Buda recalled. "Of every single book he held in his hand, he would say: 'It's a very interesting book.' And sometimes he would pencil those words inside the front cover, next to the price.

"There was rarely a day when you couldn't find a gem of a book in the stacks."

Reginald Russell, the eldest of three boys in a linen merchant's family was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, on Aug. 1, 1910. He started collecting books while he was still in boarding school in Kilkenny, Ireland. At age 17, he came to Montreal to work for the Bank of Montreal.

Tall and robust, Russell joined the Montreal Amateur Athletic Association almost as soon as he arrived.

He had the uncanny ability to seem simultaneously august yet approachable.

When the Second World War began, he enlisted in the Canadian army and served overseas with the 4 & 5th Canadian Field Regiment. He was decommissioned with the rank of lieutenant.

Russell went into the book business as a hobby in 1961 when he opened the Book Nook on Notre Dame St. He decided to open a store, he said, because his library at home was so big there was no space for any more volumes.

His entire family pitched in to help him get the business off the ground.

When stock outstripped the space, the store relocated across the street in the old Balmoral Hotel.

Russell retired from the Bank of Montreal in 1973 and relocated his bookstore to yet another location, this time on the south side of St. Antoine St.

In 1983, it moved again into 10,000 square feet on two floors of the Rogers and King Building, where it remained until the building was expropriated in 1999 to make way for an expansion of the Palais des congres. He also owned Diamond Books on Sherbrooke St., which closed three years ago.

"When Reg reaches his final destination, and St. Peter opens the book of life, Reg will take out his trusty HB pencil and try to reprice it," said bibliophile and Gazette photographer Gordon Beck, a longtime friend and customer.

"That's the way I will always remember him, sitting in his store, pricing his books with his pencil."

A son, Niall, died in 1995.

His wife, Maureen Martin, who was studying art design at Sir George Williams College when they married in 1941, died in 1999.

He is survived by his daughter Diana, who runs Russell Books in Victoria, and a son, John.

Funeral arrangements are pending.

 

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