By Kevin Greer
Lakeside Communications Manager
The “For Sale” went up in the window at The Fine Print late last fall. It didn’t take long for it to come down.
Lisa Maharry saw the post on Facebook and made the trip from her home in Delaware, Ohio, on a frigid day. Maharry has a background in publishing and education and thought it would be a great fit.
“I said to my husband (John), ‘I think we’d be good stewards of the bookstore at Lakeside,’” Maharry said. “Here we are.”
Maharry and her family have been coming to Lakeside for nearly a decade. They kept hearing people in the Columbus area talking about Lakeside and decided to see if all the vivid descriptions were true. They rented a cottage for a week and, as Maharry says, “fell in love with the place,” and bought a cottage of their own. She also found out they’re not the first members of the family to own a business in Lakeside.
“I have a history here because my great uncle owned the Lakeside newsstand in the 1950s,” Maharry said. “None of us knew about that until we got here.”
Other than putting up some wallpaper, Maharry doesn’t plan on making changes to the store. As you walk in, the right side has books geared toward adults. Young Lakesiders will head to the left, where they’ll find children’s books, puzzles and games. She’s working on getting books written by authors coming to Lakeside to give lectures this season.
“The first thing we had to do with the store was get an actual inventory system organized,” Maharry said. “Once that is done, we’ll know what we have, and then we can go forward with what we’re going to buy next. We just ask everyone to be patient with us because we want to do it right, but it’s going to take us a little while to get our feet solid and figure out all the little systems. We’re making it work.”
The store will be closed during the winter, but Maharry is looking into a way Lakesiders can still shop The Fine Print all year.
“I’d like to eventually build up the online bookstore so that we have opportunities to sell books to the Lakeside in the offseason,” Mahary said. “I think that would be a fun project down the road.”
The Fine Print re-opened in early May and has been well-received. Rather than a ribbon cutting ceremony, Maharry plans to have her store blessed and pass out some sweet treats. She is excited and a little nervous to start a new business during the Sesquicentennial celebration.
“It’s a lot of pressure,” Maharry said. “But we’re going to live up to the challenge.”
Lakeside has become a special place for the Maharry family. They meet every summer and take in the beauty of the community. John and Lisa have a daughter, Sophie, who is working on her M.D. and Ph.D at the University of North Carolina and married to Chris Roush; and sons Aaron, an engineer in California; Carson, age 16 and lifeguard at the Grindley Aquatic & Wellness Campus pool; and 11-year-old Joe, who will help at The Fine Print. She also has two grandchildren, Simon Roush (age 1 ½) and Lydia Roush, who was born in late April.
“I have a big family with my brothers and sisters, so the highlight for me is just an opportunity for everybody to meet here,” Maharry said. “Lakeside is a community of people who value their families, friends, homes and enjoy the peace and quiet. I think the biggest thing for us recently is just watching our kids grow up here and get getting some friendships that are going probably last the rest of their lives.”
