Peter Lee Ayres stood in line for 16 hours, carrying a two-page list of artists and their albums in the order of the most coveted vinyls to the least.

The longtime record collector was fourth among hundreds of people who lined the streets of Fells Point outside the Sound Garden on Saturday morning for Record Store Day, an annual celebration dedicated to independently owned sellers across the country. The skies were clear and the weather was warm as the first groups lined up before 6 p.m. Friday.

By Saturday morning, the line snaked down Thames Street, then up South Broadway, and turned onto Shakespeare Street. Passersby were shocked and confused by all the people.

Ayres, a Northern Virginia resident who usually joins the line early at the Sound Garden every year, is a Transportation Security Administration officer and almost couldn’t afford to participate this weekend because of the partial government shutdown. The shutdown has impacted the Department of Homeland Security for months as Congress negotiates a funding deal, but the Trump administration decided to bypass Congress in April to pay employees anyway.

“It has been really rough because I’ve gone months without getting paid,” he said. “Obviously they paid me. Otherwise I wouldn’t be here.”

He said he was grateful to be a part of the celebration. Ayres, who was carrying only a backpack while others had chairs set up for the evening, passed the time by “speaking with other like-minded collectors talking about music and records” before the store opened at 9 a.m. He snacked on doughnuts and drank coffee with the group.

If there were limited-edition Record Store Day items on his wish list that he couldn’t find at the Sound Garden, Ayres planned to stop by Protean Books & Records in Federal Hill and Celebrated Summer Records on Saturday to scour their stores. At the top of his list: Adrianne Lenker’s “Live at Revolution Hall.”

Just steps from the Sound Garden is Broadway Square — a grassy patch of land by the harbor that hosts the Fells Point Farmers Market and is the birthplace of Record Store Day. Record store owners from around the United States conceived the idea during a conference in Fells Point in 2007.

Bryan Burkert, owner of the Sound Garden, hosted that gathering 19 years ago, and he has a plaque on his building to commemorate it. His hope was to advocate for the industry as online music services, such as Napster, took off.

“Everybody was complaining about loss of sales,” he said. The day was inspired by Comic Book Day, which was started by stores and artists to promote their work. Major artists, including Metallica and the Rolling Stones, got behind the idea to help save record stores, Burkert said.

“It’s been a massive revival,” he said, adding that the store workers “kind of double the size of our store” on Record Store Day.

Now artists big and small often release exclusive songs, limited-edition vinyls and signed records that are sold inside the stores on the day every April. The United Kingdom has also adopted Record Store Day.

This year at the Sound Garden, many customers were excited to get their hands on a signed Hayley Williams record. Jenna Dawson, who drove from Frederick, was one of them. She slept on the sidewalk with her friends to be one of the first customers in the store. Dawson said she wanted to “show up and show out for local businesses.”

“Nothing’s more punk than physical media,” Dawson said. “I think it’s a complete rejection of paywalls and corporate greed.”

Some patrons who had previously participated in Record Store Day said it was the longest line they had seen.

Polly Jimenez and her grandson, Athreya Dravida, 15, arrived around 7 a.m. This was their second year joining the Record Store Day crowds. Jimenez, who grew up with vinyls, has handed off her collection to her grandson, who enjoys collecting them.

Dravida said he has about 800 records, but he wanted to add Joni Mitchell’s album “For The Roses” with the original artwork. Jimenez was only there to give her grandson a ride, passing the time with a French language learning book.

“We were out here last year when it was 40 degrees,” Jimenez said, but on Saturday it was about 70 degrees and sunny. “We don’t care how long we have to wait this year.”

“Well maybe we do,” she added.

A few miles north at Hampden’s Celebrated Summer Records, Ellicott City’s own Lindsey Jordan, aka Snail Mail, was signing 200 copies of a limited-edition cover of her new record “Ricochet” ahead of her show at Union Collective on Saturday night.

Matt Shaneybrook, 25, of Baltimore was in line with a copy of the record to be signed. He said most of the Record Store Day events felt like a gimmick, but he enjoyed supporting a local artist and the local business Saturday.

“It feels more intimate,” said Shaneybrook, who has been a customer at the Hampden store for a decade. “This store’s always been a good staple.”

Some local record store owners, including Andy Phillips of the Wax Atlas Record and Stereo Exchange in Northeast Baltimore, do not participate in the day. He said it’s harmful to smaller stores.

In a post to the store’s social media, Phillips said the day is well intentioned but it’s “a cynical PR blitz for an otherwise normal distro company creating false scarcity while leveraging the credibility of independent record stores to sell Taylor Swift records.” Instead, the store will have discounts and rare items for customers all weekend.

Other businesses participating in Record Store Day in Baltimore include Strawberry Fields in Hampden, Baby’s on Fire in Mount Vernon, El Suprimo Records in Fells Point, Mount Vernon Records, Normals Books and Records in Waverly, Rust-N-Shine in Highlandtown and Vinyl & Pages in the Inner Harbor area.