Do you "Adopt" discarded Golden Era Items?

[Paisley]

Bedbugs

If you like to salvage furniture from the dump or the curbside or alley, be careful about picking up upholstered items. There has been a resurgence of bedbugs.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Latest adoption: a very fine-condition 1941 printing of Webster's New International Dictionary, Second Edition -- still considered the finest unabridged American dictionary ever published. A world of information at one's fingertips, and wow -- no electricity required!

 

[Feraud]

And the more I looked at it, the more I dreaded the liklihood that if I didn't buy it, some ironic "jewelry artist" would come along and take it to chop off the keys for novelty bracelets, while tossing the rest in the trash -- the ultimate fate of most old typewriters you see in thrift stores these days. So, I paid the ten-spot and brought it home.

Good save.
Sadly this is also the fate of mechanical watches, cufflinks, and ties. They are recycled into jewelry and articles of clothing.

Glad to read there are people using the items as they were intended.

 

[Creeping Past]

I do 'adopt', but less so in the past few years, as I've been moving around.

My current rule is that to adopt something it must be (a) an item that I'm never likely to see again or (b) so cheap it wants buying.

 

[ShooShooBaby]

i am a master of golden era rescue. i've toned it down a bit (i moved into a 375 sq.foot studio with no basement storage) but when i worked at a prominent for-profit thrift store chain, it was out of control. on the weekend we would steal stuff alllll the time from the donations that was going to get thrown in the compactor by the sorting staff. vintage fruit crates, military uniforms, slightly-stained embroidered linens, torn vintage dresses... you name it, it found homes with us workers. the amount of stuff at thrift stores that gets trashed is insane. i did my part to minimize that as much as possible. i also would buy a bunch of stuff on dollar day that didn't deserve the compactor. (i'm sure someone will chastize me for OMGZ STEALING but i don't really care.)

 

[BegintheBeguine]

No, no chastizing here. It ain't stealing if it's free.

 

[dhermann1]

My brother used to work on the trash truck at Chautauqua many years ago. Thos guys were always finding treasures thrown out. Coolest thing he ever got was an atlas. We had a 1944 Encyclopedia Britannica, and the Atlas had a slip of paper saying that you should send it in after the war and get a supplement with final post war boundaries. That was never done, but my bro found a perfectly intact 1948 edition of the Britannica Atlas.
I have a 1940 edition of that same dictionary. I didn't realize it was such a classic, but it certainly could give anyone a concussion if dropped on their head.
Years ago (1977 to be exact) I was passing through Massachusetts with a friend. We stopped in a bike shop somewhere in the eastern part of the state to say hi to a friend of his. The guy had just fished a circa 1918 Pierce Arrow bicycle out of the town dump. It had an elaborate spring system in front and back, and was driven by a driveshaft, like a BMW motorcycle, instead of a chain. Very cool.