It took 13 years but the huge collection of books accumulated by Jeanette Kamman — known as St. Paul’s Book Bag Lady — has finally found a home in the Capital View Cafe on St. Paul’s West Side.

If this was a novel, the heroes would be Joe Whebbe and Rhonda Paoli, his wife and partner in their design/renovation business, who’ve saved Kamman’s 300,000 books. Then add Kathy Bauer, owner of the cafe on Smith Avenue just south of the High Bridge.

This real-life West Side story began in 2012 when Whebbe bought a turn-of-the-century house on St. Paul’s historic Holly Avenue. Then he purchased two adjoining houses from an investor.

“I was ready to begin construction on day one,” recalls Whebbe, who specializes in bringing tired homes back to life. “Then, two weeks before closing on the (Holly Street) house, I got a call from the agent for the other houses who told me the books were our responsibility.”

Whebbe was amazed at what he found. There were books everywhere in the houses, some tightly packed, some stacked to the ceilings. Closets were full and so was a bathtub. The structures were sagging under the weight of so many books.

“In the following few weeks I called every bookstore owner in town and dealers and traders all over the country,” Whebbe said. “They were interested but in the end they all came to the same conclusion: there were too many books. They advised me to fill a Dumpster and get out of there.”

But the couple couldn’t bring themselves to trash the books Kamman had called her “orphans,” even though Joe knew it was not a smart business decision. He was right. So far he’s spent $140,000 to preserve and catalog the collection.

“We should have just sent the books to recycling,” Whebbe says of this new chapter in their lives. “But Rhonda shared my feeling that we were compelled to not throw these books away but get them back to someone who wants them.”

Although Whebbe admits “I was never a book guy,” he went through some of the volumes and thought they were the most interesting he’d ever seen.

“One of the first books I picked up was missing the front cover, but all the pages were there,” he said. “It looked old; it was a copy of (Mark Twain’s) ‘The Innocents Abroad.’ I thought this has to be valuable to someone, somewhere. My crew was looking at books and found some signed copies. So I decided to start boxing up the books and putting them in storage. It  took about 14 people two weeks, working full time, to box and haul the books to climate-controlled storage less than five miles away.”

Who was the Book Bag Lady?

Not much is known about Jeanette Kamman, who died in 2014. Her obituary said she was born in Hastings and placed with the foster family of Roy and Anna Sommers, who moved to St. Paul. After graduating from Humboldt High School she was a clerk-typist for Ramsey County for 40 years before retiring in 1985. She had taken evening courses at the University of Minnesota for 10 years and received a degree in 1960.

When Jeanette filled her three houses with books she referred to them as the Kammandale Library. Her obituary lists survivors, but Kamman apparently left no instructions about what to do with her books when she entered a care facility. It also appears she lived in a St. Paul apartment, never in any of her houses. It isn’t clear how she afforded so many books.

Online tributes to Kamman after her obituary was published in the Pioneer Press give us a glimpse into who she was.

Jim Sazevich: “Oh dear Jeanette, how you added to all of our lives. Such a good example of kindness and generosity.”

Linda Wright: “When I first started at Ramsey County Jeanette was always around pushing her cart with her books. She was a fixture around the office… You will always be part of my memory.”

Mike Mikkelson: “I remember Jeanette with fondness. She cared so much that each person would have the books to complement their interests. She also found books to be of value for the art that they represent in the writing, binding and presentation of the material. I enjoyed our many conversations.”

The orphans look for a home

Joe and Rhonda tried several business plans to sell Kamman’s books. They found a few treasures, including one from 1784 that sold quickly; another was from 1803. But most are from 1900 to the late 1960s in all genres. (They are priced between $5 and $20.) Because the books were unsorted when Whebbe cleared the houses, he is never sure what a box contains. It could be religious/spiritual books or a batch of science fiction/horror.

A few of the most valuable books sold online and others were purchased during a 2023 pop-up sale on West Seventh Street, as well as at yard sales. But these sales hardly made a dent in the collection. Whebbe admits, with a laugh, “We sold some too cheaply but you pay to learn to become a book dealer.”

Whebbe, a graduate of Henry Sibley High School (now Two Rivers)  grew up on the West Side until his parents, Jerry and Londa, moved one block into West St. Paul. The senior Whebbes grew up in the area, and Jerry was a cobbler who had shoe repair shops at several locations in downtown St. Paul. He was also owner of Whebbe’s Bar and Grill on Plato Boulevard on the lower West Side.

Joe Whebbe began his career in the construction trade industry when he was an undergraduate at the University of St. Thomas and has worked on more than 500 homes in the metro area. His son Joey, whose mother is Joe’s first wife, is beginning a painting company, and Joe and Rhonda have an 8-year-old son, William, a student in West St. Paul.

All these local connections opened another chapter in this story when Whebbe got a call from Kathy Bauer asking if he would remodel the space that had been used as her cafe’s party room into a separate unit.

“Joe had done work for me before and he’s such a nice guy,” said Bauer, who also attended Henry Sibley. “I talked to him about putting in a doorway and making a separate room. When he suggested he rent the space I said it would be amazing.”

Whebbe agrees he saw this as a perfect opportunity: “We finally have space to display the books and, I hope, boost sales.”

Bauer, who grew up in Mendota Heights less than a mile from the cafe, sees her arrangement with the Book Lady’s Library as a win-win. Since late September when the store had its grand opening, she’s found people are excited about browsing the books in the 1,000-square-foot space  And the cafe will benefit when people stay to eat Mexican-American food.

“The era of books is going away,” Bauer says. “To see people coming in and looking at books, it takes you back. It’s so important to read.”

Whebbe has set up a GoFundMe site (bookladyslibrary.com) hoping to collect $120,000 to cover a year of storage and operating costs, continue cataloging and making books accessible to the public, and opening a second small bookstore.

One of his innovations in the new space is Fresh Out of the Box, a shelf holding books that are newly unboxed without anyone knowing the contents.

Through more than a decade of running a business and raising a son, Whebbe and Paoli refused to give up on getting the Book Lady’s books into the hands of people who will love them. But it hasn’t always been easy. William, who loves to fish, mentioned recently to his dad that it didn’t seem they have fished as much this summer.

“You’re right, buddy,” Joe replied. “We opened a bookstore.”

The Book Lady’s Library

Where: Capital View Cafe & Catering, 637 S. Smith Ave., St. Paul

Hours: 4-8 p.m. Wednesday; 9 a.m.-1 p.m. Thursday-Saturday

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