Little Professor Book Shop
Little Professor Book Center is an independently-owned bookstore currently located at 2717 18th Street South in downtown Homewood. It is a part of a nationwide franchise. The store is owned by the husband and wife team of Paul and Diane Seitz, who have been running it since at least the early 1970's. They owned an additional location in Roebuck Shopping City in Roebuck, but eventually sold it to the Watkins, who ran it for them. The Watkins opted not to continue as a Little Professor franchisee and renamed the store Watkins Book Shop.
The Homewood store was previously located about two blocks south, near the corner of 18th Street South and 29th Avenue South (a.k.a. The Curve in Homewood). In the late 1980's, an arsonist set a fire between Little Professor and the antique store behind it. Little Professor was declared a total loss by the insurance company, primarily because of smoke damage to the inventory. The store was allowed to sell any intact books at a substantial discount, however, and did so out of their parking lot for a week or two. After the damage was repaired and new inventory obtained, Little Professor reopened.
The Seitzes opened two additional Little Professor stores in the Birmingham area during the 1980's. One was located on Overton Road in Mountain Brook. The other was in Crestline. The latter was only open for approximately one year. The former was also only open for a relatively short time.
Little Professor moved to its current location in the 1990's. Crape Myrtle's Cafe is located inside the book store, but is not owned by the Seitzes.