Pennsylvania Loves Harry Potter

This is perhaps old news, but I love the fact that the town in which I live is in the top ten of Amazon.com's "Harry-est" towns in America. Amazon apparently used the data from the U.S. census (town population) versus the number of pre-orders of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows per capita (per person). The 2007 population estimate at the website of the U.S. Census Bureau for Doylestown, PA is 8,149. In 2000, the U.S. census revealed the population in Doylestown to be only slightly higher (~8,200), of which nearly 14% were those under 18 years of age.

Now, the "Harry-est" town in America was Falls Church, VA, which in 2000 had a population of 10,377 people (according the U.S. census), and which steadily rose through the year 2007 (the U.S. Census Bureau reports this info as a 10,948 population estimate). The second "Harry-est" town was Gig Harbor, WA, and this is impressive - they only had as their population estimate in 2007 by the Census Bureau, 6, 621. So Falls Church was the "Harry-est", but had over 3,000 more people living there than the second "Harry-est" town, and over 2,000 more people than my hometown, which was the 9th "Harry-est" town. Are you confused yet? The point is this. There were less people in Gig Harbor and in Doylestown, which means that there were probably more Potter books in Gig Harbor per square mile than in Falls Church, VA, and you can be sure that there were many Potter books in households per square mile in Doylestown, PA. Of course, this doesn't account for all the books sold by the local bookstores and the chain bookstores (Borders, Barnes & Noble, etc.). I had reserved my book at the local Doylestown Bookshop, and picked it up at midnight on July 21st. I luckily got about fifth place in line - the line itself went around the block outside and I heard that the cashiers were in place until after 2 AM.

At any rate, why do I find this so fascinating? People sometimes smile awkwardly when I talk about Harry Potter analysis in Doylestown, acting as if this is a foreign subject, but let's get some things straight. We were the 9th "Harry-est" town in America for that last book, and while some of the people here might be closet Harry readers, the books certainly aren't gathering any dust.

As a side note, the "Top 100 Harry-est Towns" list includes some other towns in Pennsylvania. I will bold the towns that I've visited in the past.

6. Media (this is west of Doylestown; dang, they beat us on the list)
14. West Chester (I went to college here)
20. Downingtown (15 mins. from West Chester)
24. Mechanicsburg
35. Collegeville (between Doylestown and West Chester)
51. Kennett Square (15 mins. from West Chester)
82. Ambler (on the way to Philly from Doylestown, about 40 mins. away)
89. Lewisburg
97. Stroudsburg (WCU marching band was better than East Stroudsburg's, sorry East Stroudsburg, the truth hurts)

The majority of these locations are Philadelphia suburbs, and Mechanicsburg and Lewisburg are closer to the center of the state, but not quite the center. Mechanicsburg is in the south of Pennsylvania and Lewisburg is further north. So, Pennsylvania did have nine towns out of a hundred as the "Harry-est" in the nation according to Amazon.com. Whew! Alas, Pennsylvania was the 23rd "Harry-est" state in the nation according to Amazon.com's ranking of the states. But I guess we Pennsylvanians can content ourselves with the fact that one of the two epithets in Deathly Hallows that Rowling selected was by William Penn, after whom Pennsylvania is named. So, take that, capital of the nation, Washington, D.C. (who is the "Harry-est" state - which is not a state). Or take that, Vermont, who is actually a state and is the "Harr-est" after D.C. HAH!

Oh, and don't forget that Amazon.com's list doesn't include the free-loaders at the library. lol.