News Readers is city’s oldest family-owned bookstore

Brother and sister Diana and Al Molnar are co-owners of News Readers Bookstore at 4 W. Main St. in Fairborn.

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By Ashley Long, Contributing Writer 2:32 PM Wednesday, February 24, 2010

FAIRBORN — When Al Molnar agreed to work at his family’s bookstore for three years after graduating from Wright State University, he never thought that three would turn into 30.

Michael and Joan Molnar, Al Molnar’s parents, opened News Readers Bookstore, Fairborn’s first, at its original location, 124 N. Broad St., in 1967.

“In 1967, Fairborn didn’t have a bookstore,” said Al Molnar. “All you had were some drugstores that had some spinners and some paperbacks. So when a teacher wanted you to read Mark Twain, you would go to the library and their two copies would be checked out. You’d have to drive to Wilkie’s (bookstore) downtown or go to the drugstore to see if they had it, but they didn’t carry much. So we said, hey, we’ll start a bookstore.”

The Molnars kept the store family-owned, hiring their three children as employees at early ages.

Three locations and 43 years later, News Readers Bookstore is located at 4 W. Main St. in downtown Fairborn. It is the “oldest family owned bookstore and news stand in the Dayton area to our knowledge,” said Al Molnar, who now co-owns the store with his sister Diana.

The store houses around 5,000 books and offers a bargain basement where books can be bought for as low as 29 cents.

However, the book business is highly competitive with stores like Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club offering the newest releases at discounted prices. Molnar says News Readers is still around because there are no major book chains in downtown Fairborn. He also credits the service his employees offer to customers.

The biggest competition, however, appears to be the shift from magazines and books to text messaging and Twitter.

Although business is not what it once was, Molnar knows from experience how to save for hard times and has no plans to close the bookstore his family began more than four decades ago.

“Someday maybe someone will be taking their little granddaughter out and they’ll be saying ‘Gosh what are those? Those are books. Grandma used to sit at the end of the bed and read those to me I remember that,’ ” he said with a laugh.

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