KNOXVILLE — Walt Dossett, 69, of Sequoyah Hills keeps the due-date slips in a Maxwell House can on top of his dryer, and the can is getting full.
The slips are all for one book, the Knox County Public Library’s copy of Holston Valley Days, 1780–1850, which Dossett finished in April 2019 and has been trying to return ever since. Each time he drops it at the desk, a clerk scans it and hands it back with a new due date.
“I put a hold on it that first spring because somebody else had it out,” Dossett said. “Then I got it and I read it, it’s fine, it’s a lot about salt, and I took it back. And the screen says it’s on hold for me. So I said, ma’am, I’m the one that put the hold, I’m done with it, and she says yes sir, and she’s real nice, and she gives it to me. I never did learn the online part where you cancel it. My daughter set that up for me one time and I couldn’t tell you the password.”
Pam Lusk, a circulation clerk, said Mr. Dossett is always pleasant about it. “We did tell him the hold can be cancelled from his account,” she said. “He said he’d think about it, and then he was in the next week for something else, so I didn’t bring it up again.”
Every hand-back has come with a bookmark from the Friends of the Library, and Lusk lets him pick. “I’ll say, you’ve got the cardinal already, Mr. Dossett, let me look under here, because we got some different ones in,” she said.
Dossett keeps the bookmarks in the drawer with the batteries, and the book is due back this Saturday.