My family’s history and story is of great concern to, so much so that I intend to reconstruct the family tree as far as I can get in order to know who came before me.
In this same sense, I put a lot a value into objects that have reached through the generations. I have china, some furniture, personal items, photos and photo albums, etc.
Everything tells a piece of a story I wasn’t able to fully live through and instead just brushed me growing up.
It gives me a sense of belonging.
My grandparents were not wealthy people. They were products of the Great Depression. They kept nearly everything they ever and bought and every major purchase was carefully calculated.
I only ever saw my grandad wear one watch. A Timex from probably the late 1980’s. I would guess it cost < $20 new at Walmart back then.
It still works. I usually only wear it for special occasions. I’ve spent way more than it’s value having jewelers maintain it over the last 25 years.
I still miss the old man. You can’t put a price tag on those memories.
No I don’t.
So, yes*.
I have a few objects of importance that have been passed down but I don’t like to horde stuff. For me it can’t just be something they owned but something they valued or actually used.
And admittedly something that isn’t outrageously large and/or broken.
Being broken often means it was used and valued. I have an old wrist watch that is, apparently, irrepairable. It isn’t going anywhere. An old TV with which I grew up, went.
We call them trophies and I invoke my fifth amendment rights.
This isn’t a public trial. Just keep your peace.
The most heirloom thing I own is a special publication from our local newspaper from 1933(? I’m not sure if the exact year, but it’s definitely the thirties) that used to belong to my great grandmother.
It’s a newspaper sized book that’s maybe 50 pages and it celebrates the 150th anniversary of my hometown.
I don’t think it’s worth any significant money, but I think it’s fascinating to flip through the stories and read the old ads.
I have a few, and created one of my own. I have a steamer trunk that’s been in the family for 5 or more generations, the family Bible from who knows how far back, and proposed to my wife with the ring my papa used to propose to my mom. I also had a sword forged for my wedding, engraved with our family name. While I don’t intend to have children I plan on passing these things down to my nephews when the time comes
Than sounds like a very well thought plan.
I’ve got an old wooden sofa that came from my father’s grandmothers home. I don’t know much more about it, but it’s probably a hundred years old.
Nice!
No. We used to have many. My grandparents kept them. After they died, my parents, aunts, and uncle threw everything that wasn’t worth money into a dumpster. They kept the jewelry, coins, watches, and other valuables; everything worth less than $50 got trashed. Photo albums, collars from old pets, pictures they drew as children, sentimental trinkets, my grandpa’s pocket knives, my great grandpa’s letters home during the war for Czech independence, all of it, gone. A lot of it had been stuff I did in school or pictures of me.
“What do you want that for? It ain’t worth nothing,” they would tell me when I asked to keep anything.
People suck.
As my Silent Generation relatives have been dying off, each of them has had boxes of family history - photos, sometimes dating back to early 1900s, diaries/journals, kids’ school art, yearbooks… None of it organized, few of the photos with any indication of who’s in them, where or when they were taken, even who did the art. Shoebox after shoebox of Christmas pictures. Sometimes, one of the survivors will recognize photos, but no one has ever made the effort to record the oral histories, so they will soon be just photos of strangers in mystery locations.
Organize that stuff. Curate it. Make it possible for kids to care.
That was painful to read.
A little while ago a relative told us about how they moved for their parents work. All the toys were thrown out, all the photos; like you everything that wasn’t worth something was disposed of. They even drowned the family cat.
It’s a bit amazing they’re not hardcore hoarders, they just low key keep things.
They drowned the cat? That’s disturbing.
That is for sure!
Several knives, blades, and daggers in my dad’s knife collection belonged to his grandfather, and were passed down to his father. He says he plans on dividing the collection among his kids when the time comes.
Knives mean a lot in our family. We each got our first pocket knife on our 8th birthday, the same way our dad got his first one. Knife safety (especially passing a knife) is part ritual, part common sense. We give them as gifts for birthdays, Christmas, and Easter. It’s a way of making sure the people we love the most will always have the oldest and most useful tool mankind ever invented in their pocket.
I know it’s considered bad luck in some cultures, but to us, it’s a heartfelt act of love. I’ll be honored to have my father’s knife one day.
We have an accordion played by my great grandfather.
Does anyone still knows how to play it?
Unfortunately no! I will learn if it passes into my hands - I already play other instruments.
we have a box filled with baby teeth going back about 8 generations.
we have another box filled with locks of baby hair.
and I haven’t even mentioned the box of babies yet.
That was going really well unril it wasn’t.
I have a painting of the Australian desert that belonged to my mother. It’s banished to the second bedroom because it’s got a thick coating of nicotine, but I plan to have it cleaned some day.
check out Baumgartner Restoration on YouTube. you might learn how to do it, or even better, understand you’re woefully out of your depth on a full restoration.
reach out and see if he’s got any contacts that he trusts in your area. presumably you live in Australia.
the fine art world is small, and the fine art restoration community is even smaller. he’s bound to know someone or even could even restore it himself.
Nicotine can be hard to clean. I wish you all the luck with that.
Yes. The thing is, I is po’. My grandma was rich. I have been saddled with “the Narnia cupboard” which only fits when you have high ceilings (one of those with vases), and a matching desk. So whenever I move, I have to figure out if they fit and also hope the removals guys know how to put Narnia together without dropping the damn doors (again).
I’m getting shot of them as soon as my mother passes away. I have some lovely paintings my grandma did and that’s enough where heirlooms are concerned.
Only things I’ve had passed down to me like that have been guns.
Yes, just a few things:
My great-great-grandfather’s portrait, bayonet and a copy of his discharge papers from his Civil War service.
The flag from my grandfather’s coffin.
There are things I’d like to have/keep in the family when my parents pass.
