Book fair to raise funds to digitise newspapers

A local book fair will be a bookworm's delight with over 40,000 books on sale.

The Hāwera Genealogy Society is holding its fourth annual book fair this week.

Convenor for the Hāwera Genealogy Society, Jill Williams, says there will be a great range of books.

"There will be a great selection of fiction and non fiction. We have sports, travel, poetry, cooking, western and jigsaw puzzles." Jill says the books are affordable.

"Nothing is over $2. The children's books are 50 cents."

This year the proceeds made from the book fair are going towards digitising old newspapers for the Papers Past website.

"It has been a long-term goal to get the newspapers digitalised. This is happening in collaboration with national libraries. They will be digitised next year."

Jill says the digitised newspapers will be very helpful for the society.

"It will help with researching families. Rather than just having a date of birth, the newspapers will help in adding to the story."

Proceeds from last year's book fair went towards running un-named photos from the Hawera Genealogy collection on a TV at the Hāwera LibraryPlus."

Jill says there will be a book for everyone at the fair.

"There will be a great range of books for everyone's taste."

■ The Hāwera Genealogy Society annual book fair, 3-5 October at St Joseph's Hall on Victoria street, Hāwera. Thursday: 8.30am-7pm, Friday: 8.30am- 6pm, Saturday: 9am-2pm.