Gotham Book Mart

Steloff's husband, David Moss, suggested both the store's name and its "Wise Men ..." motto, which was inspired by Washington Irving.

Steloff nurtured the store as a literary sanctuary for the avant-garde, distributing copies of the banned Lady Chatterley's Lover, Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer, and safeguarded Anais Nin's books when she fled Paris.

Under Steloff's oversight, the store became a meeting place for the literati and 20th century cultural icons, essentially serving as a literary salon.

"[6] The director Woody Allen, a frequent customer of film books at the shop, referred to it as "everyone's fantasy of what the ideal bookshop is.

The store became the commercial flagship of Gorey's works, selling his books, calendars, greeting cards, T-shirts, and other products.

[12][13] The history of the store is covered in the documentary film, Frances Steloff: Memoirs of a Bookseller, directed in 1987 by Deborah Dickson.

The building at 41 West 47th Street that housed the Gotham Book Mart for the longest period of its existence was purchased by Steloff from Columbia University in 1946 for $65,000.

According to him, he had recently endured three hernia operations and was struggling to save the store from closing by inventorying the over $3 million worth of books and posting them on the internet.

[19] Other factors that could have been involved included the fact that Barnes & Noble opened a bookstore just around the corner from the Gotham, and also that general book-buying habits of consumers had shifted with the advent of the internet age.

The primary factors affecting the store appears to have been a combination of the rising rent for real estate in Manhattan, competition from book superstores, and Brown's mismanagement of the business—factors which influenced the closures of a number of other venerable bookstores during the same period.

Penn will also digitize materials from the Collection, and create public events such as lectures and exhibits based on its contents.

[25] Many notable authors, celebrities, and major figures involved in publishing were customers of the store and friends with the owners and staff.