PSU Magazine Winter 2006

Lemman says. "You don't have the numbers, the volume or sales that would allow you to maximize your profit. You're only selling books ordered for classes, so you have a lim– ited number of publications," Lemman says. "lt's more a community than a business, its sole purpose for being is to help the students." At least a half-dozen private compa– nies have tried to set up competing bookstores on the PSU campus, Lem– man says. "They always failed ." I n 1952, the renamed Portland State Extension Center moved to the former Lincoln High School building in downtown Portland. Everything was in Lincoln Hall except a few administra– tive offices that moved into purchased homes. Portland State grew rapidly in size and stature, earning college status in 1955 and university status in 1969. In those same years, the bookstore moved from Lincoln Hall to the Smith Union subbasement, up one floor to the basement, then in 1965 to the Ondine building (where Fifth Avenue Cinema is now), to the University Center Building in 1970, and finally to its present loca– tion in the Urban Center in 2000. John Meyer was first hired by the bookstore in 1959. He's probably moved with the business more than any other employee, only taking time off for a stint in the Navy during the Vietnam War. Back then the co-op was like an extended family, Meyer says. "They had a job waiting for me when I got back in '64." Recently, the bookstore celebrated its fifth anniversary in the Urban Cen– ter. It has a 30-year lease, says Brown , and the nonprofit has repaid all loans and debt incurred in the new construc– tion. The bookstore has never been stronger. Meyer still works part-time at the bookstore, even though technically he's retired. He and the other long-timers can li st nearly half a dozen bookstore floods. There was Vanport, of course. There was the 1995 "exploding toilet" at the University Center building that rained clown on the kitchen of Sam's Hof Brau below (now McDonald's). More recently, in the Urban Center, a routine fire inspection resulted in a four– foot buildup of water behind the fire door, which, needless to say, somehow got opened. "There was lots of water-lots of water," says Viki Gillespie, a JS-year-emp loyee. "just the other day, a little drip pan under a plant overflowed," Meyer says. "Everybody panicked ." What's with all the floods? Gillespie doesn't hesitate to offer a bigger meaning to it all. "Rebirth," she says. "When I think back on my 35 years, the bookstore has always changed, always adapted. It has always survived." D (Lisa Loving, a Portland freelance writer; wrote the article "Kabuki Northwest" in the fall 2005 PSU Magazine.) Today the bookstore is located on SW Fifth between Mill and Montgomery streets. 22 PSU MAGAZINE WINTER 2006 A few heads turned last summer when Congress delivered an investigative report on the rising cost of college text– books-a study that was touched off by the PSU Bookstore, OSPIRG, and U.S. Rep. David Wu, who together demanded the study at a press conference earlier in the year. In July the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, released a report on the rising costs of college textbooks. It found that the price of textbooks had increased at twice the rate of inflation since 1986. Further, the GAO study showed that textbook publishers' insistence on creat– ing new book editions with only slight modifications over previous editions, as well as the inclusion of CD-ROM inserts, has significantly driven up costs for students. "The GAO report confirms what stu– dents have shared with me over the past few years," Wu told the press. "Textbook prices are increasing and are a growing financial burden to students." The study results are disputed by the Association of American Publishers, a textbook trade organization. According to the AAP, the report exaggerated text– book price increases and lumped the cost of student supplies in with book prices. The complete GAO report can be read at www.gao.gov . "We were very proud to see that we had some input," says Ken Brown, PSU Bookstore manager. "We are a student organization, and I don't think enough people realize that."