Booksellers are a notoriously different breed; they have been called quirky, eccentric, opinionated, droll, odd and sometimes just downright strange.
Into this mix comes Bill Minors, local proprietor of Books Galore and More on Perry St. While Bill is not your average book store owner, he is not one of those eccentric bibliophiles who have a great understanding of fifteenth century poetry but no noticeable people skills.
It turns out that Bill’s past in the corporate world of book publishing, combined with his diverse interests in areas such as television network trivia contests, Scottish Country Dancing, lawn bowling and a budding career as a stand-up comedian, have led him to be a more well-rounded seller of the written word than many of his contemporaries.
Bill came to settle in Port Perry six years ago via a somewhat zigzaged route. The journey from there to here began in Scotland, home of haggis, the bagpipes, fine scotch and men who are not afraid to dance.
At 21, by himself and with no firm game plan, Bill set forth lock, stock and kilt to seek his fortune in Canada, Toronto to be exact. He was drawn to banking initially, decided this was not his cup of tea and was soon caught up in the world of book publishing.
There was a girl too, but they parted ways, so Bill took his slightly shaken body and soul and moved to the other side of the world, New Zealand to be precise.
Love conquers all; one year later Bill returned to Canada and the girl called Kathy, and thus began his future as a book publishing salesman, a Scottish country dancer, a purveyor of new and used books, a TV trivia fanatic, and up and coming stand-up comedian and a lawn bowler extraordinare; the extraordinaire part being Bill’s words, not this author.
Bill’s love of trivia is well known by his friends and customers but his ten year involvement on Canadian network TV trivia shows is less widely known.
In the golden years of Canadian Game Shows, 1970 through to the early 80’s, Bill was on TV about 60-70 times, on such shows as CTV’s Headline Hunters and Guess What.
Says Bill “It was cheap television to produce and they needed lots of contestants so I would show up constantly at the CTV studios and invariably I would be picked. Like Jeopardy, if you win you return, so between winning and showing up at the studios, I did a lot of shows.”
Of course, the best part, besides winning, was the prizes. Over the years Bill, and Kathy as well, won trips to Acapulco, Barbados, and London, England. They won appliances large and small, tools, sets of encyclopedias, countless watches, blenders, shavers; the list goes on.
When asked what his best prize was Bill replied “That’s a tough one. All three of the trips were great, Kathy loved the dishwasher we won and we both loved the huge box of Braun appliances, shavers, blenders etc.; it was a great gift.”
Even when he lost, he won a consolation prize. His worst prize, 40 lbs of gum. ”It wasn’t even Wrigley’s, it was from somewhere in Quebec. It took Kathy and I five Halloween’s to dump all that gum,” he said.
Bill and Kathy’s two daughters grew up thinking that everybody had drawers full of watches and small appliances at their disposal. They also grew to realize they couldn’t beat Bill at Trivial Pursuit; he complains that no one will play with him.
Well after Bill stopped the TV trivia games, and he only stopped because they were taken off the air, reruns kept his trivia shows alive. Several years after finishing, he says that he would be flipping channels and come across a Headline Hunters show he was on.
Bill still laughs about one of his book publishing colleagues checking into a Saskatoon hotel five years after Headline Hunters went off the air, turning on his TV set and there was Bill. The friend said “God, there’s Minors again, he’s everywhere.” Fortunately, the fame didn’t go to his head.
Bill bought Books Galore 11 years ago and commuted from Scarborough daily until six years ago. He and Kathy love Port Perry.
Bill was one of the people involved in starting the Highlands of Durham Scottish Country Dances and he and Kathy dance weekly in Utica as well as participating in various community events. His love of dancing has never been a surprise to any of his friends but a few eyebrows were raised when Bill took up lawn bowling, sometimes thought to be a genteel sport practiced by those of a certain age.
“Not so,” says Bill. “Kathy and I were looking for something to do that was out of doors, and for me, preferrably something I couldn’t get hurt at. And of course, I come from a long line of lawn bowlers. It’s a family tradition and I decided to uphold the tradition. The food’s great too.” Turns out there is a potluck dinner after each game that Bill thinks is just an added bonus to a fine tradition.
Last year Bill was asked to do a twenty minute comedy routine at the town hall, as part of Stu Bennett’s Scottish evening. A star was born. Bill has done two shows since then and takes his new craft seriously; he can be found every morning at one of the local eateries and has been known to try out his routines on unsuspecting breakfast partners.
I have to admit that after hearing some of his jokes I might be persuaded to attend one of his shows. His favourite joke; “I’ve been researching my clan history and found something interesting. It seems that one of our clan battles was not going very well, in fact we were going to lose, so the chief decided to surrender. The method of surrender is to turn your back to the enemy, bend over, and flip up your kilt, as a token of defeat. It would have worked, except the clan that was attacking at the time were the Gay Gordons.”
Bill says moving to Port Perry was the best thing he ever did, perhaps other than marrying Kathy and having two daughters.
His customers at Books Galore provide him with many stories and anecdotes and he says he often goes home and tells Kathy that his day produced, “one for the book”.
There are no bad days in a bookstore but some are more interesting than others. If Bill should ever complain about a bad day, he gets no sympathy at home. They see working in town, surrounded by books, with customers fetching coffees and lunch, as an enviable existance.
Not that Bill Minors would complain; he’s too busy matching wits with his customers, finding elusive books for people and planning his next stand-up routine.
Should you want to hear some of it, Bill is available for breakfast daily, somewhere in Port Perry.
By Marjorie Fleming
Focus on Scugog
Personalities
