In 1960 the aspiring Texas writer Larry McMurtry enrolled in Stanford University with a fellowship in the Stegner creative writing program. Along with his studies, McMurtry became immersed in the world of antiquarian and used bookshops that flourished during that time in the San Francisco Bay Area, and it became an infatuation that, along with writing, would consume and change his life.
Among the many books McMurtry acquired during his San Francisco residency for his personal reading and eventual book business were books by women travelers, a topic which he found captivating for their true tales of travel to distant lands by strong-willed, independent women.
Slowly he assembled a personal collection of books by and about women travelers. After 50 years the collection grew to almost 2000 volumes and contained 320 years of travel narratives, from 1690 to 2010. This is the story of the collection, what happened to it, and the women travelers who made it so captivating – women whom McMurtry occasionally referred to as his “runaways.”
An in-person and virtual presentation by John Crichton, author, editor, antiquarian bookseller, and proprietor of The Brick Row Book Shop, San Francisco, California