Three area authors have released books about mom-and-pop stores, venison cooking, and Freemasonry.

‘A Pound of Jumbo, A Loaf of Bread ...’

Linda Randig of Butler has compiled a book about the old mom-and-pop stores that were in Butler between 1903 and 2017.

“My husband was raised on Institute Hill. I was not raised in town, and he would tell me little stories about all the little stores,” Randig said.

“Even though they’re houses or apartments now, you can still spot them, so we started to play a little game trying to spot them.”

That inspired her to do some research.

“At first I was just going to make a list and give it to the library,” she said.

But after she found about 450 of the little stores, she assembled them into the book, “A Pound of Jumbo, A Loaf of Bread ...”

She said Brose’s Superette, just outside the city limits, is the oldest one of these stores remaining.

Randig said she is really a poet at heart, and has published books of poetry and family history before.

The 150-page book, which includes 16 pages of black-and-white photographs, is available by emailing joeswife803@gmail.com. A fourth printing is beginning soon.

‘Quality Venison Cookbook’

“Quality Venison Cookbook: Great Recipes from the Kitchen of Steve and Gale Loder” features more than 300 recipes for preparing what the hunters have harvested during the whitetail deer season.

The Loders of Cranberry Township also include freezing, marinating, cleaning and planning tips in the multiple editions of their classic book.

The current edition is available from Rowman and Littlefield Publishing.

‘Speculative Freemasonry and the Enlightenment’

R. William Weisberger, a professor of history at Butler County Community College and adjunct professor at the University of Pittsburgh, has released the second edition of his book, “Speculative Freemasonry and the Enlightenment: A Study of the Craft in London, Paris, Prague, Vienna and Philadelphia.”

According to Weisberger, the work describes how Masons on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean were mostly enlighteners, political reformers or moderate revolutionaries.

The 240-page book published by McFarland & Co. is available in paperback and digital formats.