May 17, 2026

Rare Harry Potter Find

Show Notes
Transcript

Five Good News Stories: Rare Harry Potter Auction, Record Carrot Cake, Community Tips, Rope Swing Grandma, and Loose Bull
Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: a well-read rare first-edition, first-impression softcover of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (Bloomsbury, June 1997; one of 5,150) owned by Naveed is headed to auction and expected to fetch about $5,000, identifiable by printing anomalies like a duplicate wand list, a missing “o” in “philosophers” on the back cover, and early Hogwarts wording. In British Columbia, café owner Ted of Granville’s Coffee marked an 80th birthday by assembling a 17-by-17-foot carrot cake weighing 6,044 pounds from 430 cakes, setting a new record. In Rhode Island, a town rallied after $20 was stolen from autistic barista Michael’s tip jar, raising about $900 and prompting a safer jar. A 78-year-old woman went viral riding a huge Utah rope swing between 500-foot cliffs. In Virginia, a bull escaped near Eastern Mennonite University, was tranquilized, and returned.

00:10 Rare Harry Potter Find
01:35 Giant Carrot Cake Record
02:20 Tip Jar Kindness Rally
03:29 Grandma Rope Swing Dare
04:17 Loose Bull Near Campus

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Caloroga Shark Media Either I'm Jennie Mack with your five

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good news stories. You have an old copy of Harry

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Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. While one that spent years

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sitting on a shelf was expected to go for thousands

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at an auction, it belongs to Navide, who received the

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book as a child and by his own account, actually

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used it the way books are meant to be used.

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By reading it. Now, at thirty seven years old, he's

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decided to part with it. But what makes it value

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is that it's not pristine, but it's one of the

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rare first editions, first impression softcover copies printed by Bloomsbury

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in June of nineteen ninety seven. There were and fifty

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of those produced. Mayvie'd said, I liked it very much.

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I read it quite a lot and went on to

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read the other Harry Potter books. It's been on my

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shelf for a few years now, and I thought this

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would be a good time to pass it on as

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someone else who will appreciate it. How do you know

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it is a first edition? Well, if you go to

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page fifty three, one Wand is listed twice in Harry's

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School supply. Another clue is on the back cover, the

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letter O is missing from the word philosophers. Also, the

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school is described as Hogwarts School of Wizardry and Witchcraft,

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wording that was later reversed. Expert Robert French said, this

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well thumbed example has clearly been much loved and read

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repeatedly exactly what it was printed to do. There's some

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interesting anomaies which identify a first edition first printing of

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the book either softer hardcover. The most obvious telltale sign

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is that you don't have a first impression. If the

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bottom of the front cover states that the book is

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a triple Smarties Gold Award winner, it was expected to

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go for round five thousand dollars. A cafe owner in

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British Columbia decided to celebrate their eightieth birthday by building

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a carrot cake the size of a small apartment. Yep,

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that's what Ted did. Ted owns Granville's Coffee. He assembled

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a carrot cake measuring seventeen feet by seventeen feet. How

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much did it weigh, John well sixty four pounds. It

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required help from multiple bakeries and took more than a

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month to complete. In the end, the cake was made

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from four hundred and thirty individual cakes. All right, John,

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how do I make such a cake? Well? You need

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seventeen hundred and sixty pounds of carrots, seven hundred pounds

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of butter, thousands of eggs, and nearly two thousand pounds

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of icing. This breaks the previous record of a carrot cake,

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which weighed only forty five seventy four pounds. This one

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over six thousand pounds. A different coffee shop in Rhode

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Island is getting some love after the community rallied around

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a local barista whose tip jar was stolen. Michael, who

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is autistic, works for her mom. Red White and Brew

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also employs workers with mental disabilities and sells products made

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by the workers. Some jerk stole twenty dollars from Michael's tipjar.

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Michael knows many of the regulars personally, and thus the

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theft felt deeply personal to him. Mom told the Washington

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Post he was really interested in food service, and I

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thought what better way to connect him to community than

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a coffee shop. To me, it just made sense. The

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police chief heard what happened and brought over materials for

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a new tip jar with a lid, and promised to

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look into the theft. Then the town got involved. The

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mayor shared the story and wrote, Red, White, and Brew

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is a very special place run by wonderful people. I've

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come to know Michael very well, and believe me, it's

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not the money that's bothering him. He's hurt. The next day,

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customer showed up and started leaving tips. One woman whose

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own son is autistic, left one hundred dollars and told

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Michael he inspired her to believe her son could also

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have a fulfilling future as working adults. People kept coming in.

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By the end, Michael had about nine hundred dollars in tips.

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Mom said that was the most special part. It was

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truly just one person after another leading with such kindness

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and grace that it renewed my love for humans and humanity.

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Barbara is seventy eight. She's gone viral. She'd took on

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a massive rope swing in Utah, launching herself onto a cliff.

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Operators say it's the longest rope swing in the US.

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The swing is suspended between two five hundred foot rock

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cliffs in the desert, creating a giant pendulum arc over

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the red rock landscape. No thank you, I have discovered

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as an adult that I'm more scared of heights than

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I realized. I actually found this out in Iceland. We

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went whitewater rafting in Iceland and then we went up

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and there was a spot where you could jump off

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a cliff into the water, and yalill do that, and

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then boy, I just had that visceral reaction. I was like,

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I couldn't do it. I had no idea how that

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inmate I digress Andy operates the swing. He said, we

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tried to design the swing so anyone can use it,

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including elderly people, children and those with disabilities. So it's

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great seeing and taken full advantage of people. In Harrisonburg, Virginia,

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had a deal with a bull on the loose. The

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bull escaped from a livestock auction and spent more than

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an hour roaming freely near Eastern Minna Night University. The

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police said on social media, if you come across the

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bull police, do not approach it or try to capture

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it yourself. These animals are large, quick, and can be

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very dangerous. Multiple agencies got involved. The bull was tranquilized

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was transported back to its owner. The police said, we

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would like to thank the community for staying inside, keeping

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us updated on signings during the incident. That incident once

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again was loose bull near campus. Those here five good

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news stories for today. I have a great day.