Before we start, I should mention that my friend and I decided to postpone the last yard sale of the season by a week. It gives us a bit more time to prepare, and it’ll also be nice to take this weekend mostly off. It’s a bit of a gamble not yard sailing on what will be a unseasonably warm day, but the next weekend should be decent still, and the cooler weather might help sell some of the nice fall fashion clothing I’ve found recently. For now, the plan is to do the yard sale on Sunday October 1st, but if the weather turns sour the date could be changed again.
These photos came from that multi-million dollar house I’ve mentioned in three previous posts. Those guys just threw out a little bit of everything! All in all, I saved enough photos to almost fill up your average sock drawer.
The oldest were probably these old cabinet photos.
These were taken on the Saturnia and Homeric steamships in the early 50s. Presumably, these folks were travelling in first class.
My favourites though were probably the ones from WWII. Click and zoom in for a better look! There’s a lot of neat details you’d miss otherwise.
This message was written on the back of the one colourized photo.
Some of the pictures look to have been taken in the desert. Maybe they were taken during the North African campaign, in which Canada played a significant part.
I thought the guy at the center of this picture looked a bit like Winston Churchill. This person does have a similar collection of medals, and Churchill did make an appearance in North Africa in 1942, so in theory it could be him. What do you think?
There’s one more part of this series to share! Otherwise, I hope to come across some more big rich people hauls soon.
Relevant links
1. Facebook page
2. My eBay listings
3. Etsy store
4. Kijiji listings
5. Contribute to garbagefinds.com
6. Follow me on Instagram
Email: thingsifindinthegarbage@gmail.com. I often fall behind on emails, so I apologize in advance if it takes me a while to get back to you.
It certainly looks like Winston Churchill to me. See http://images.slideplayer.com/27/9259689/slides/slide_3.jpg
IS it yard “sailing” or selling ? I’d like to see a yard “sail”.
I say yard sailing, because it sounds like a verb I wish existed (ie: the act of having a yard sale). I’ve written saling before, but my spellcheck doesn’t like that and it looks weird. I guess I could say yard selling as well, but it sounds different than yard sale (while yard sailing is funny and has the “a” sound).
Looks like Churchill to me too.
Cool picts. Thanks for sharing.
It is Winston…great find! How can I buy the portrait photos? Thanks. Fran
Send me an email or Facebook message and we can work something out!
Hi
How much you want for the WWII Photos, please.
Thanks
JF
I will probably do an eBay auction with them, that way I don’t have to think about pricing. If you email me I can provide a link when the auction is live (probably in October sometime).
Hi Martin,
If you are ready to sale the WWII photos send me a mail to jf.urruty@hotmail.com
Thanks.
JF
These are great. I find it so sad that people throw away such old photos. I also love that you save them.
Look at the airplane in the photo of your possible Churchill. He rode a B-24 named Commando to meet with Stalin. The tail number of that plane was….AL504. If you look in the photo you can see both “Commando” and a tail number of “AL50” with probably the 4 obscured. How exciting! That flight stopped in Africa as well. Photos of Churchill with Stalin also show a similar uniform.
Thanks for the info! That does seem to confirm that this is Churchill, probably in 1942 or 1943. Here’s an article about the Commando airplane: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commando_(aircraft)
Loved seeing pictures of the Homeric! My girlfriend and I went to Europe in 1955 aboard the Homeric. Needless to say we were not in first class but it was a wonderful ship and a wonderful trip for two 20 year olds! Four weeks in Europe for $695.
Thanks for sharing! I can’t imagine crossing the Atlantic by boat (my Grandma did in the 40s and was seasick the whole time, I suspect I would be too) but it was pretty commonplace back in the day.
Couldn’t you donate the war photographs to the Canadian War Museum rather than selling them into private hands? The Museum could probably identify who the pilot was.
I tend to think that museums have enough to deal with as it is. For example, when I contacted the local holocaust museum about my Nazi passport I was told they already had five or six examples, and they didn’t seem particularly excited to acquire another (though I’m sure they would have taken it). I feel like the war museum probably has a huge backload of photos, much of which are not being dealt with (WWII photos are not particularly uncommon after all – WWI photos would be a different story). If they reach out to me and ask for them, I would consider donating, but otherwise I doubt they are particularly interested and I may as well make some money from the photos.
Wow, how neat! I always get a little sad when I see people throwing out these gorgeous old photos, but I guess it’s tough to hang onto so many! Cool finds. 🙂
I can see that in some cases, but when you’re rich you generally have enough space and money to store these things. There weren’t that many really, so I think it’s probably more that they didn’t care.
Sure you were planning to do so, but I’d sell the Churchill photo – it is certainly him- separately as it is obviously a previously unseen private archive photo. I love that you can date the handshake photo to July 10-15 1944 because of the calendar. I wonder if Johnny Montreal was just enlisting in the RCAF then? Thanks for sharing and saving.
Wow this is pretty awesome, what a great find with the Churchill pic! I can’t believe some people actually throw old pictures away, they are such a nice proof that the past existed 🙂