town of mount royal – Things I find in the garbage

Here are my finds from last week’s run though Mount Royal. Everything I saved sat in front of recently sold homes.

This spot gave me some canned food, most of which isn’t expired.

I also found a plastic toolbox with a bunch of tools inside. It’s nothing too special, but it makes for good yard sale material.

This place previously produced a cool Whitall Tatum & Co wooden apothecary box (photo 1, photo 2) and a vintage F.E. Garrett photo, both of which I shared only on Facebook. (For the record, I’ll probably post this kind of thing on WordPress as well from now on).

I found two old jewellery boxes this time around.

This one was made in Japan and has a pretty funky design. There’s a music box in the bottom but it doesn’t seem to work anymore. I think the ballerina figurine was meant to rotate.

There was also a classic ’50s gold-tone box.

It’s in fine shape. The white stuff on the drawers is some kind of fuzz that should rub off easily. There is a little black stain on the right but that might come off too. The boxes were mostly emptied out save for a bit of random junk and a few baby teeth, which you can see on the top right shelf.

I found some jewellery near the bottom of the same bag. I assume they sorted through what was in the boxes, and tossed the stuff they didn’t want. I found a couple more skeleton keys – it seems like I’ve been finding a lot of those recently!

There were a few other pieces inside a little Birks jewellery box. The pieces on the left and center are all silver. The earrings and the necklace on the left hand side are matching.

I also saved a Swatch watch, marked as being made in 1988, …

… a small collection of coins,

… and 11 brass military buttons. I think these were probably made around WWII.

I’ve been keeping my eye on this last spot for a while now but it hasn’t really given me anything of note to discuss. This time around I found a few small bits of jewellery, including a single sterling silver cufflink and a Cornell University pin. My best find though was tucked in between that tan-coloured garbage bin and the brooms and mops in the back, which were sticking out of a another bin.

It’s a piece called “Three-Layered Man” by a local artist named Morrie Rohrlick.

Rohrlick seems to be well known within the Montreal area. He studied Fine Arts at McGill and taught for many years at Concordia University. He passed away at the age of 85 just over a year ago. Here’s his obituary, if anyone’s curious.

Regardless, it’s a great piece (roughly 2′ by 1.25′) that looks to be a signed (silkcreen?) print. It’s marked 86/150 in the center, which I think means there were 150 made. I’m sure I could sell this for a modest chunk of change but I might just keep it myself. The piece speaks to me, and I appreciate tit even more because I saved it from the trash!

I should have another post up tomorrow featuring something neat I found in the Golden Square Mile area on Monday.

Here’s some finds from a run a couple weeks ago in TMR. It’s a bit late now so this post won’t have as much detail as others, but I can definitely show you my most notable finds.

The recycling bin above contained a few interesting items that probably shouldn’t have been in a recycle bin. There were two large (maybe 2′ tall?) liquor bottles with stands. One once held Cutty Sark Whisky …

… while the other held J&B scotch. They’re kind of cool, and might sell for 5$ each at a yard sale.

I also found this cool old Royal slide-weight scale, which I’ll probably try to sell for 20$ …

… and a vintage “crush-a-cube” cast aluminum ice cube crusher. These seem to go for around 10$ on eBay.

I found this late 1960s “Instant Mind Power” (by magician Harry Lorayne) learning guide in the same bin a week prior. It seems to have more to do with improving memory rather than developing psychic powers, which is what I originally assumed it was meant to do.

The place that provided me the iPods and postage stamps put out a big pile that night. I’m guessing they finally moved (the house was sold) and that this was the last of their undesirables. I didn’t see anything out on the curb the week after.

There was definitely a lot of good reusable stuff to be saved, but I’ll show just the finds that stuck out. I saved a box of 90s-era hockey cards;

… a framed image of Mary, which I think is from the Eastern Orthodox tradition;

… a 14k gold pin (made for Bechtel, the largest construction / engineering company in the United States);

… and two pairs of basically new binoculars. Neither are super valuable, but they should fetch around 10$ each at a yard sale.

Otherwise, the spot that provided the lawn bowling balls and the Clubmaster Ray Ban sunglasses gave me a few more things, including …

… a nice tackle box,

… a totally functional Timex Expedition watch (even the battery was working!),

… and a working digital camera. This thing (a Pentax Optio with 7.1 megapixels) takes AA batteries, which is nice because I won’t have to get a charger for it. It’s only worth around 20$, but it’s handy to keep around in case my camera dies for whatever reason. It’s always good to have a backup!

I should have a similar post up soon featuring last week’s TMR finds. Check back soon!

Tag: town of mount royal

Morrie

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