Presses run overtime as crowds snap up news of Obama victory

People went to The Washington Post (above) and other newspapers to make sure they could get copies of the election issues. The Post decided at midday yesterday to publish 350,000 copies of a commemorative edition. (Karen Bleier/AFP/Getty Images)

NEW YORK - Newsstands quickly sold out of yesterday's papers declaring Barack Obama the nation's first black president as some jubilant customers picked up two, three, or even 30 copies as keepsakes.

The New York Times and the Chicago Tribune in Obama's hometown were among papers that restarted their printing presses to produce hundreds of thousands of additional copies.

Entrepreneurs were seeking as much as $200 for the Times on eBay.

"Own a piece of history," Walter Elliott said as he hawked 90 copies of The Sun from a Baltimore corner.

The Plain Dealer in Cleveland offered high-quality reprints of the front page for $54.95. Below the headline "Change Has Come," a close-up of Obama covers three-fourths of the page.

John Penley, a white man who recalled drinking out of the "wrong" water fountain as a kid in North Carolina, searched New York's Lower East Side for papers to mark an event he never dreamed possible in his lifetime.

"There was one copy left at the bodega around the corner, and people were actually fighting for it," said Penley, a retired photojournalist.

At New York's Port Authority bus terminal, Ralston Montaque grabbed 30 copies of the Times for family and friends. "Everybody has to read [the news], brother," he said.

A newsstand in Evanston, Ill., sold 100 copies of the Times in 10 minutes - even as the major local papers, the Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times, rushed to print hundreds of thousands of extra copies.

In Miami's predominantly black Liberty City, newspapers were sold out at stores all along Martin Luther King Boulevard, where residents wore Obama T-shirts and waited for buses on corners with hand-painted quotes from the civil-rights leader.

"I've got to put this in a frame because this is history," said Larry Johnson as he searched for a newspaper cover of Obama.

Papers all over the country found crowds of customers outside their buildings clamoring for copies.

The Times decided to print another 75,000 copies for sale in New York as vending machines and retail stores sold out by midmorning. The Tribune restarted its presses for an extra 200,000 - 10 times more than the increase it had planned. The Washington Post decided at midday to publish 350,000 copies of a slimmed-down commemorative edition.

In Philadelphia, vendors reported that the election issue was selling better than the commemoration for the Philadelphia Phillies' recent World Series championship.

At News World in Washington, customers sorted through papers from Boston, Houston, and other cities after the Post and Times sold out.

"I got what they had left," said Michael Garner, clutching a copy of The Washington Times as he exited the congested store.

One customer wanted anything that had a picture of Obama's family, while Antoine Napel from Senegal picked up copies of the French newspaper Le Figaro and the Spanish-language La Libertad.

In Cambridge, Mass., the supervisor at Out of Town News regretted he didn't order more.

"If I realized who was going to win, I would have had a lot more papers. I wasn't sure," Richard O'Connor said. "Not slighting Senator McCain, but if he had won, I don't think the sales would have been as great."