Erasmus Books Still Feels Like a Secret

Magical bookstore on Wayne Street been connecting readers with used and rare titles for 45 years

BY ALEC EVANS // POSTED JUNE 23, 2025

If you turn down Wayne Street near downtown South Bend, there is a home located a stone's throw from Eddy with overgrown foliage out front. It's a two story Prairie style house with white stucco walls and a low hip roof covered in burnt sienna shingles. When you walk up the driveway to enter the building, there is a door with a bronze sign to your right installed on the stucco wall reading “Erasmus Books”.

You walk inside, and are greeted by Klaus, the black dog who lives there. After greeting Klaus, you notice a large collection of books stored on shelves and stacked in piles on the floor, as well as the musty sweet smell of lignin from the aging bound pages. This place feels like a treasure chest of literature waiting to be explored.

The room on your right when you enter has the owner, Philip Schatz, sitting behind a desk waiting to check out the next customer.

Schatz, along with Bill Storey, were partners who ran the store together until Bill passed away in 2014. They first met when they were at the University of Notre Dame in the late 1970s. Storey became a professor in liturgical studies at Notre Dame in 1967 after receiving his doctorate and remained a professor until 1987. Schatz graduated from Notre Dame with a bachelor's degree in literature and theology as well as a master's degree in theology. Their love for literature was immense, and in 1980, that love would pair well with an opportunity presented to them.

In 1978, two teachers from St. Joseph High School — Rita and Tom Gerencher — opened a bookstore north of Roseland called The Haunted Bookshop.

“They had been there for upward of two years,” Schatz recalls. “And their hope as St. Joe teachers was that they would run the bookstore and be teachers.”

After two years in operation, the task of running a bookstore and teaching became difficult to maintain.

“They found that it was too much and they had to choose between doing one or the other," said Schatz. "And they both stayed with teaching.”

The decision left with them the problem of selling the business and its collection of 20,000 books. Schatz and Storey decided to purchase the business and to keep operations running smoothly.

Shortly after acquiring the store, the pair decided to relocate for more shelf space. The home where Erasmus is today — designed by Norman Ray Shambleau in 1912 — was available and they decided it was a great place to run the store. This move wasn't without its problems though.

“This location was problematic from the beginning because it's in a kind of neighborhood," said Schatz. "There were rules about whether you can start a business in a neighborhood and so the stipulation about this house would be that they would look more favorably on our having a business if we were living here.”

They agreed to the city's request, but the city had one more stipulation for Schatz and Storey. They had to keep it in its present shape.

Due to the home's historical significance, South Bend Preservation Commission reached out to Schatz in 1992 to add the home in their registry and preserve its history for decades to come.

Schatz and Storey kept “The Haunted Bookstore” name for a short while after opening their store, but soon realized that a name change was needed.

“I had a few calls from people who presumed that it was a shop that only had horror titles,” Schatz recalls. “And I thought, oh goodness, that's not going to work.”

Since Schatz and Storey enjoyed the works of Dutch theologian Erasmus of Rotterdam, who lived during the 15th century, they chose to name the store after him. Erasmus — much like Schatz and Storey — sold rare and important books. The Dutch theologian crisscrossed Europe, selling titles in languages he found important to preserve, such as Latin and Greek.

The beauty of any used bookstore is that the interests of its owner are reflected in its collection. Since Schatz and Storey had a deeper background in philosophy and theology, a large part of the collection reflects that, as well as a wide assortment of classic literature. But there's no horror section, and Schatz is open about the other categories the store doesn't carry.

“The fact that there's no science is because Bill and I weren't too good in science and wouldn't know what to pick out of all the books and what has enduring value or not,” Schatz said. “Another category that didn't prove helpful to people was books about health. People said, 'I don't want old books about back pain, I want new books about back pain.'”

Erasmus Books is celebrating its 45th birthday this year, and Schatz plans to keep the business running as long as possible.

“I'm 75 this year, and I'm hoping to continue on and have the energy and interest and stuff to keep it going. I do have somebody now who comes every couple of weeks and puts books away, and that helps me a lot. But I'm continuing to enjoy the things that people offer me.”

When I first visited Erasmus, looking for any Vonnegut books that were not yet in my collection, I asked Philip where they might be and he said they'd be downstairs in the fiction section. Great used bookstores always have a basement.

After seeing what was on the shelf and coming back upstairs, I told him that those titles were already in my collection. Philip raised his finger in the air, like an idea struck his mind, and walked over to a stack of books next to the top of the basement stairs. He pulled out two Vonnegut books from the pile, and showed them to me to see if I was interested.

How impressive that amongst the tens of thousands of books there, he remembered the location of two that I would be interested in. If Erasmus is a treasure chest of literature, Philip is a guide that led me to the X on the map.