Farewell, BookCourt: You Showed What a Bookstore Can Do

BookCourt—the beloved, family-owned and family-run bookshop at 163 Court Street, in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn—opened on September 12, 1981. It will close at the end of this year, on December 31st. Thirty-five years as an independent bookseller: it wasn’t a bad run. “Against many odds, BookCourt grew and flourished in a time when many independent bookstores closed,” the owners, Henry M. Zook and Mary B. Gannett, wrote in a letter to their customers, this morning. They owned the building, which helped. Still, retirement beckoned; vehemently bucking market trends is, perhaps, a young man’s game. You can’t blame Zook and Gannett for wanting a break. A few months ago, Community Bookstore, another Court Street institution—this one infamous for its overstuffed aisles and bar hours (it was often closed at noon, but open at 2 A.M.)—also shut its doors. Lamenting the slow death of strange little bookstores is not new. We watch them go with our hands over our hearts.