A life in letters: Scripture Union - Bookshops

(Click here to read about my previous job, as Librarian at Carluke.)
I climbed the steep flight of steps leading from Glasgow’s Bothwell Street to St Vincent Street, passed Alexander ‘Greek’ Thompson’s famous Free Church building and arrived on the pavement opposite Scripture Union’s office and bookshop. Confidently, I crossed the road, ran up the front steps, and knocked on the door.

280 St Vincent Street, Glasgow  Formerly HQ of Scripture Union - Scotland

My friend John Brand, the bookshop manager, had undertaken to introduce me to the duties of my new post as bookshop manager in Falkirk which I took up in June 1977. I spend some days with him in Glasgow; we then visited the Edinburgh shop where I met the manager, Chris Andrews and Timothy the patchwork mouse who nested happily on her desk. Finally, we went to Falkirk where I was introduced to my assistant Christine, and after a few more days’ induction, I was left to get on with the job.

I worked for just twelve months in the narrow shop which hugged the pavement in Cow Wynd just past the sub post-office, before taking over from John as manager of the Glasgow shop when he left to go to Bible College. My boss was John Butler, then the General Secretary of Scripture Union in Scotland.
Scripture Union in Scotland was committed to introducing children to God through running S.U. groups in Primary and Secondary Schools, and organising camps, summer missions, and special events throughout the year. At that point, the bookshops helped support this work financially and by supplying appropriate literature, as well as providing outlets for the Bible Reading Notes and Sunday School teaching materials produced by the English wing of the organisation, and making a contribution to the spiritual life and outreach of the communities in which they were situated.

My responsibilities, both in Glasgow and Falkirk, included ordering, displaying and promoting stock, and managing staff and money. We sold not just Christian books, but music on cassette tape and LP record, Bible reading notes, greetings cards, Bibles and hymn books, material for Sunday School and youth workers, and stationery items.

In contrast to the shops in Glasgow and Edinburgh which, in the face of competition from other Christian outlets focussed almost exclusively on supporting and resourcing members of the Scripture Union family the Falkirk shop, known locally as ‘the Bible shop’ served the whole Christian community in the town, and was much used by the public at large, particularly for the purchase of greetings cards and Bibles for special occasions such as christenings.

I had a leaflet printed to promote our work, with the slogan ‘More than just another shop’. It emphasised both the spiritual value of the merchandise we were selling, and also our hope that people coming through the door would detect in the atmosphere and in the friendliness of the staff something special, something of God’s grace and love.  I was certainly motivated to show something of this grace in my own interactions with people, although I don’t recall ever engaging any customers in conversation on spiritual issues apart from discussing the subject-matter of books.

Later, when I moved to the Glasgow shop, marketing opportunities included producing advertising brochures promoting the sale of books by mail order, and reviewing books for Scripture Union – Scotland’s own quarterly news-sheet (I recall concluding an review of a book on Christian attitudes to music expressing my doubts as to whether ‘Jesus would ever be found dancing to the savage beat of rock.’  It was, I knew, a powerful phrase, but even as I wrote it I wondered if it were actually true.)

At Glasgow I was responsible for providing all the camps and holiday missions held by Scripture Union across Scotland with sale-or-return bookstalls. Early each year, I prepared an annotated list of recommended titles from which the volunteers running the events selected their requirements. I would review and collate their returns, and then purchase enough stock to meet their needs. 
I remember commenting in the draft of one year’s list of recommended title on what I saw as the unfortunate tendency of Christians to consume biographies of outstanding Christians one after another. Each book would give us a brief, heightened sense of hunger for God, and of longing to be as committed to God and to the faith as the person we were reading about, but after a few days our spiritual focus had reverted to its previous level, until we read another inspiring book and the cycle was repeated. In the notes I sent upstairs for typing, I referred to these temporary spiritual ‘highs’ as being ‘cheap thrills’ – I was surprised when it was pointed out to me by the troubled lady at the keyboard that it was hardly an appropriate term to use: in her judgement the phrase had exclusively sexual connotations.  I now realise that part of the problem with living vicariously through other people’s experiences is that we have not learned to be comfortable in our own skin – we seek to model our spiritual lives on what we see in others rather than exploring our own uniqueness and discovering how God calls us to live out our faith.

Looking back at these years with Scripture Union, a couple of issues stand out. One relates to the range of theology represented in my stock. Scripture Union was and remains an evangelical organisation, and it was to be expected that the books sold in its shops would represent a broadly evangelical theological position, but I wasn’t given any guidelines to inform my purchasing. Each of the other bookshop managers in the Scottish Scripture Union network, while maintaining a standard, staple stock had their own distinctive emphases. Chris Andrews in Edinburgh, for instance, had a particular interest in books reflecting the more mystical, contemplative tradition, and this interest was reflected on her shelves.

I, however, was still very theologically naïve. I remember writing an article about Christian books for the newsletter at Ebenezer Hall, Coatdyke, in which I discussed which publishing houses were reliable in terms of issuing ‘sound’ evangelical works. I had yet to learn that aspects of truth were to be found in many different places. And I recall being disturbed to discover that my predecessor at the Glasgow shop had ordered from the Collins representative twenty copies of a novel which, thought it may have been written by a Christian, didn’t seem to me to be particularly Christian in emphasis when I dipped into it and even included a fairly explicit description of a naked woman. This I couldn’t handle, and I persuaded the uncomprehending rep to take it back

Whatever I would think about that particular title were I to come across it now, I had much to learn about how Christian faith can be expressed in writing and about how a proper evaluation of a book involves considering the purpose for which it was written and the point the author is making rather than simply reacting to something within it which takes you beyond your comfort zone.

A second issue was my concern about commercialism, and the balance between sacred and secular objectives when Christianity and business are linked. My later explorations of this theme in the history of Scottish religious publishing were prompted by my experiences at Scripture Union. Initially, I was excited by the regular visits of the publishers’ representatives with the latest catalogues announcing new publications which I could promote and sell. But I soon began to wonder whether in fact so many new titles were necessary. I found myself tempted to promote new titles as ‘must haves’ for my customers. But were they really all essential reading? Would they really have a significant impact on people which existing works could not deliver?

Sometimes the answer to this was ‘yes’, but more often it was ‘perhaps’ and sometimes ‘certainly not!’ At times, I felt I had stepped on to a treadmill of commerce, promoting new titles simply to maintain cash-flow. I was horrified by some of the ‘Christian’ products we were offered – Christian only in the sense that ordinary items were offered for sale decorated with verses from the Bible – such as the Pritt glue-sticks each bearing a small round sticker on which was printed a biblical text in a minute font This seemed a blatant attempt to exploit the Christian market. And I was dismayed for a number of reasons to see in a supplier’s catalogue a whale-shaped piece of leather, designated ‘Winnie the Whale,’ clearly designed for disciplining your kids – it bore the verse ‘Spare the rod and spoil the child.’

For the most part, however, I was delighted to be involved in distributing Christian literature. Of the titles which appeared when I was working with Scripture Union, three stand out. One was published while I was still in Falkirk – Joni, by Joni Eareckson described the American author’s discovery of faith in God after she had been left paralysed from the neck down as the result of a diving accident. We sensed that this was going to be a ‘big’ book – people, aware of its impending publication, were asking for copies well before it appeared – and following its release I took an advertisement in the local Falkirk newspaper to promote it. Initial sales following the appearance of this ad were disappointing, but interest grew in subsequent weeks and Joni sold in substantial numbers over the next few years.

Then there was Ronald Sider’s call to develop a sense of responsibility in the face of extreme poverty, and commit to action to alleviate it. His Rich Christians in an age of hunger made a deep impact on the evangelical and the wider Christian community. Finally, there was the publication of the New International Version of the Bible, the Scottish launch of which I attended at a hotel in Edinburgh’s George Street. Inspired by stories of the huge success of the New English Bible, the New Testament part of which had been published in 1961 when Edward England the manager of the S.U. bookshop in London had ordered thousands of copies.  I placed a substantial order for the new Bible, and then wondered if I’d done the right thing, before worrying that I wouldn’t have enough copies to meet the initial demand, and ordering still more copies.

I tried a different approach to mail order marketing by taking out a small ad in the personal column of the Daily Telegraph offering to supply copies of the new Bible post free. Regrettably, on the day this was due to appear, the Telegraph wasn’t published in Scotland so I didn’t get to see the carefully-crafted wording of my advertisement in print, and in the event it failed to yield one single order!  But though not selling in such dramatic quantities as the New English Bible had on its first appearing, the New International Version steadily gained in popularity, and within a few months, the piles of Bible-filled cardboard boxes in my back shop melted away, much to my relief.

I enjoyed working for Scripture Union. I appreciated that Christian ethos of the organisation, and the friendliness and supportiveness of the staff, in particular my bookshop team. And I think I did a good job with an enthusiasm which was appreciated by colleagues and customers like. But unresolved personal anxieties made my last months at 280 St Vincent Street very difficult. I left Scripture Union three years after beginning to work with the organisation, and took up my next post, as school librarian at Airdrie Academy.

The happiest of my Scripture Union days were probably those when I was based in Falkirk. I remember Saturdays in the office there, with my Saturday girl Mhairi Todd (who was once addressed on a computer-generated label as ‘M hairi 3 odd) and Fiona, a teenager from one of the villages close to Falkirk whom I’d met at the St Andrews SU mission would sometimes drop in. We’d buy millionaire’s shortbread from the bakers along the road, and sell books and joke with the customers, and life was sweet.
(Click here to read about my next role as school librarian at Airdrie Academy.)