Better late than never — even when “late” means more than a century.
An 84-year-old man has returned a magazine to his New Hampshire library more than 130 years after it was checked out. Because late fees had been frozen, John Hanson avoided what would otherwise have been a staggering $12,055 bill.
The missing item was the September 1894 edition of The Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine. Somehow, it came into Hanson’s possession and remained at his Barrington home for decades, according to a social media post from the Concord Public Library earlier this month.
Hanson decided it was finally time to return the periodical after reading a Concord Monitor article about the library’s decision to freeze fines.
“Yeah, when I saw that, I said to myself, ‘Boy, this would be a good time to bring it back,’” Hanson told NBC News.
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The century-old magazine will not go back into circulation. Still, the library’s fine freeze saved Hanson from a $12,055 penalty for returning it 48,220 days overdue.
“We’ve witnessed many happy faces since announcing our fine freeze! Of course, we expected long overdue books to be returned, but certainly not something from the late 19th century!” the Concord Public Library wrote.