Month: September 2012

Old books and more ephemera

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This is some of the stuff I found a few weeks back with the old newspapers. There’s some pretty old stuff in here. Take a look!


Let’s start off with an old book. This one is “Henry the fifth” by A J Church. According to wiki, Henry the Fifth was pretty awesome at conquering France back in the day. The book itself is from 1891, a second printing of the first edition. It’s pretty much in perfect shape. Maybe I could get 15-20$ for it from a collector.


A bit of Quebec Communist Party paraphernalia. Interesting that on the fake money communist is spelled “Quommunist,” which I wonder could be a combination of Quebec and Communist, since the French don’t spell it any different than us.

Also interesting are all the references to the 1970 October Crisis of Quebec, when the FLQ thing blew up. The front picture of Pierre Laporte Bridge (in Quebec City) is probably a reference to Pierre Laporte himself, who was Quebec’s deputy premier murdered during the crisis.

The backside references a few other October crisis characters. Michel Chartrand was a staunch supporter of the FLQ and an important union leader in Quebec. Jacques Rose was part of the Chenier cell of the FLQ responsible for killing Laporte and was convicted of being an accessory after the fact. Pierre Valierres was the intellectual leader of the FLQ. These characters were all part of some “financial surveillance committee” are all oddly undersigned by James Cross as Governor, odd because James Cross was the British diplomat kidnapped during the FLQ crisis. I figure it’s all part of some joke I can’t quite understand. I suppose this is a reminder of how crazy things got in Quebec at this time.

As for the guy on the pamphlet – Guy Desautels – he ran as a candidate for the Communist party in my area of Montreal in one federal and one provincial election before seemingly disappearing from politics.

The reverse of that pamphlet.

Here’s a listing of available books from a bookstore from times past that specialized in old and rare books.


A few old stamp books. I imagine these are an earlier version of those points you get for buying Coke products (or whatever). In this case, you get stamps (presumably when you buy a product) and put them in this book to get free stuff in the future. That was likely a pretty innovative marketing practice at the time.


A couple of postcards, probably from the 60s, featuring very idealistic portrayals of the native peoples. Very interesting to look at though. The back has a blurb trying to sell the land to potential travellers: “Mexico – Fiesta? Siesta? Take your choice in the wonderful Mexican sun;” and “South Pacific: Magic Lands where you step into carefree happiness and Empress flights make dreams come true.”

A little book of funny stories by Pierre Doris. English wikipedia has only a stub about Doris, but French wikipedia has a bit more. His real name was Pierre Tugot, and he was known for his dark humor.

I’ll try to translate one of the quotations from his French wiki.

« Nuance : quand l’homme est mort, on l’enterre ; quand l’arbre est mort, on le déterre ! »

Subtle difference: when a person dies, we put them in the ground ; when a tree dies, we dig it out!

I found these old insurance papers from 1969. Not super exciting, but I figure stuff like this might make good movie props.

I’m going to have to leave it at that for now, as I have an appointment to go pick up some worms for a worm composter I’m making. More interesting papers to come, I promise!

Mickey Mouse 1937 Belt Buckle

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Here’s some stuff from yesterday:

These French books were on the corner of Gilford and Drolet. Hope someone got them!

I came across this bunch of food on Mont-Royal and St Dominique. There were two whole boxes full of cut carrots, and a bunch of candy. The jelly beans were still good (I ate a couple), but the others were pretty stiff. It’s a shame to throw away good canned food though. I was going to come back later and stash them away, but never found the time.

I came across an interesting looking “doohickey” in the small box in the center right…

I don’t know what it is, but it looked clean and I’m always intrigued by mystery so I took it. It’s pretty heavy. Does anyone have an idea what it could be? The two parts (circuit board looking thing and other thing) are separate).


I salvaged a couple of coins and two new containers of tennis balls from a place on Waverly.

Now I’m back to the place (St Urbain / Clermont) I’ve been going to for weeks now. The older lady who lived there passed on a year or so ago, and according to people I’ve talked to while looking there she never threw anything out.

This is a tin with the Lion’s Club logo. The Lion’s Club began in 1917. It was started by Melvin Jones, a businessman with a charitable streak in him, who convinced some other business folk to take an active role in community service.

According to the Lions website: “He soon joined the Business Circle, a businessmen’s luncheon group, and was shortly elected secretary. This group was one of many at that time devoted solely to promoting the financial interests of their membership. Because of their limited appeal, they were destined to disappear. Melvin Jones, then a 38-year-old Chicago business leader, had other plans.

‘What if these men,’ Melvin Jones asked, “who are successful because of their drive, intelligence and ambition, were to put their talents to work improving their communities?” Thus, at his invitation, delegates from men’s clubs met in Chicago to lay the groundwork for such an organization and on June 7, 1917, Lions Clubs International was born”.

Speaking of history, this unopened jello is pretty ancient. I also got a jar of Cheez Whiz – expiry date 1988. I may try and make one of these, and perhaps open the jar of Cheez Whiz, just to see. I’ll let you know how that turns out.

I found one of those glass balls that refract light in cool patterns. I’ll probably set this up somewhere at home.

Two silver plate spoons, one of the decorative variety (from Atlantic City) and one of the usable variety. There’s a shovel bottle opener and a little (cheese?) knife as well.

More odds and ends. I kind of like the police boat toy.


An old Coty “Emeraude” beauty powder. There’s still some in there (smells pretty nice too!). Some people are trying to sell it, so I might as well. It’s a really lovely box at the least.

A couple of mugs. I kind of like the design on the left (marked Japan, with a sticker saying it’s from Levco Montreal). The right one is from Romania.

A nice vintage change-purse.

And now for Mickey. I found this belt buckle attached to a mildew-y old leather belt (which I’ve since gotten the mildew off – it’s a got an interesting design on it itself!). The front says “Mickey Mouse 1937 Hollywood Cal. USA” and the reverse says “Sunrubber Co. USA” “A Disney Prod.” and “California U.S.A”. Mickey mouse was only nine years old at the time, and apparently this was made before a redesign that hid his tail to make him look more human (source: link below).

More or less the same belt buckle sold for 650 bucks at The Pop Top Shop. (See link also for a short look at the history behind this piece). I don’t expect to make nearly that much, as there’s definitely a benefit to having a well-established online store and mines a bit more dinged up, but it’s definitely worth a little bit, assuming it cleans up alright.

Now, what’s the best way to clean off that blue stuff? And what is that blue stuff?

Food and nails

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I got out again today and found some decent stuff.

Pretty early on I found these bags of rice in front of a depanneur. The bags are sealed, so I doubt much can go wrong with them.

An old kick of the bag revealed that the contents were pretty heavy. I explored further…

The bags were full of hardware. Lots of nails, screws, hinges, and lots of other good stuff that I don’t really recognize. This would cost you a pretty penny at a store, and I took all of it back with me in my backpack.

There was also a box with some decent looking cutlery and other kitchen stuff. I left it on a more populated road for others to scavenge from.

There was a photo album in with all the other stuff. Makes you wonder why it was all thrown out in the first place.


There was a whole bunch of stuff out on Papineau near St-Gregoire. Some of it was kind of gross, but there were a lot of good dishes and a nice big metal pot. I took a few small knives, but left the rest. When I went back later, the big pot was gone and a little chunk was taken out of the dishes, so that’s good.

I found a fair bit of food here. I was rummaging through what seemed like someone’s pantry, and a guy who lived nearby gave me a big can of unopened wasabi peas, which was pretty nice. I haven’t had those for a while, and thought I didn’t like them, but it turns out I do!

There were three (now only one) granola bars in that box. Sesame seeds taste find (though they expired in 2011). There’s some lentils which seem fine, and the can of wasabi peas. There’s also some face clay stuff, which I’m sure is still good.

The organic sugar was open but it looks pretty good. There’s also some salt, some tumeric that seems fine, and some sealed organic wheat bran. For some reason I took a picture of the clay stuff twice!

This was in it’s original packaging (marked 34$) and is in like new condition. It’s pretty damn sharp – I know, having cut myself on it preparing this photo. Not sure I’ll use it, but it seems like it might be pretty good so I’ll give it a shot.

All kinds of tea! All of it is in sealed bags (other than the Twinings Earl Grey, which is loose but looks fine), so I’m sure it’s good to go. There are also two catnip sprayer things for cats.

Now I gotta cook some food using this stuff! Maybe after making friends with the neighborhood cats.