Someone on Instagram messaged me about this massive pile of trash a few weeks before I moved. My first thought was bedbugs, but apparently the person had talked to the locals and was told that it was some guy clearing out his parent’s stuff. I went with a friend, and clearly we were picking through the dregs of a once great collection, but the dregs were still pretty good.
I found no gold, but a few pieces of silver. I forgot to take a picture of one piece, and I sold it for scrap before the move. It looked like a “warmer” part from an antique tea set, kind of like the bottom of this one but more rectangular. Anyways, it had no hallmarks but tested as silver, and the scrap guy determined it was 80%. So that was probably worth 100$ or so, I forget exactly what it weighed but it was hefty enough. Otherwise, I scrounged this WWII era sterling silver ID bracelet from the bottom of a box of junk. I sold a similar one back in the day for 100$, but the price of silver has gone up a fair bit since then.
This ornate picture framed was also decorated with silver. The silver is pretty thin, so it’s wasn’t worth more than 10$ for scrap, but it’s very pretty regardless.
I picked out some interesting old documents, including a fair bit of hippie stuff. Gandalf’s Garden was a community in England which ran a shop and also published a few magazines. As you can probably tell by the font and the cover art, this was a pretty psychedelic community. Mine is the first issue of the magazine, and it’s in near mint condition. Others in worse condition have sold for well over a hundred, so I listed mine at 250$. We’ll see what happens.
Otherwise, I saved a magazine from the only issue of a magazine published by the Antiuniversity of London, which was another short-lived late 1960s counterculture institution. It’s hard to find any issues online, so I’m asking a good sum for it.
Otherwise, I have a 1970s “Ghetto Ferret” from McGill (no other copies seem to exist), a copy of “Outlook ’72” published by a therapy department of the Douglas Hospital, and the Pipkin Papers, which was apparently written & drawn in 1969 by John Weldon who became well known (by other people, not me) for producing NFB films. The market was surprisingly strong for this one. I ended up selling it for 200$ to an archivist friend, while also throwing in some of the lesser known magazines.
Also interesting were these Birth Control Handbooks from the late 60s/early 70s. Abortion was illegal at the time, and even disseminating this info was illegal. These were written in Montreal but were distributed internationally, with a bunch going to the States. Apparently 3 million were made, so they’re not super uncommon, but they are collectible. They sold for 50$ each on my Instagram selling page.
Here’s a bit more paper ephemera, including old CNR and Cunard Line schedules, an Asprey catalogue, and a WWII era newspaper insert promoting General Motors.
These folks definitely had some antiques. This impressive Canadian Art Pottery vase was made by a company called Ecanada in the 1920s. It cleaned up nicely, and I gave it to a friend to sell on Marketplace.
I’m not sure how to date this copper stuff. There’s a lot of copper pieces that are made to look old, and I don’t know how the manufacturing style changed over the centuries & millennia, although my guess is that this vessel is around 100 years old. I’m also not sure people care – antique copper doesn’t seem like a hot market right now. Regardless, if you know anything about old copper, let us know in the comments!
This tin plated copper pot is also quite old. I found a little bag of skeleton keys, which I emptied inside the pot. One of them is foldable, which I hadn’t seen before.
This might be my most intriguing find. I haven’t had much time to research it yet, but the closest match with a Google image search was this piece attributed to 12th-13th century Iran. It doesn’t seem like a stretch to me, it does look very old! That doesn’t necessarily make it valuable, but it’s a pretty cool piece regardless. If anyone has any relevant info, please let me know!
Lastly, I found two of these fun reverse glass painted lights. The image is painted on four separate panes to give it a 3d look. I look forward to trying them out, and maybe putting one or both on my wall. They were made in France and have the plugs to match, so I have to figure that out before I do.