Recently Discovered Treasures!
Article Written by John Davis
In the popular mind, treasures are hidden in secret coves somewhere far away. Few realize they may quite literally be surrounded by them. An understanding of your hometown, region, or historical past might help you find something astounding. Even better, you might have something and not even know it!
In England two summers ago repair work under a 1950’s building revealed what looked like small boards stuck in the mud. A trip to the archaeologists at a nearby university revealed they were wax tablets. Although the wax was long gone, the imprint on the wax dug through to the wood, revealing the first writings ever discovered from ancient dwellers of Olde England.
A family in Illinois found a box filled with papers in the attic of an old home they purchased. The papers were indeed letters which dated back to 1843. They were the correspondence of a single family. Now, the Civil War letters of that family are included in a book by a professor from Sangamon State University in Illinois.
A professor at Washington University in St. Louis, who made a life long study of the seventeenth century British Poet Laureate John Dryden, discovered a never before known poem by Dryden while researching his past in musty archives in Oxford, England.
Here in our small town renovations on the President of Athens State University’s home revealed that in the mid-nineteenth century racetrack betting was a common practice. The walls of his home were stuffed with old documents for insulation! The papers revealed tickets to a previously unknown racetrack. In the same light, a discovery in Florissant, Missouri, of an old dwelling’s insulation revealed what life was like during the early days of America. It seems the documents found there recorded the classroom practices of the first school for Native American girls founded by the Catholic Sister St. Rose Philippine Duchesne.
A genealogist came across a story in Life Magazine from 1943. He was distressed to discover that a merchant sailor was buried, unremarked and without ceremony, in New York City, having died of natural causes. The researcher set to work. In time, he discovered who the man was, from whence he came, and even found out who his living relatives in Australia were. He was able to contact them, and received their heartfelt thanks for solving a family story about which they knew nothing for over 70 years.
So treasures are everywhere. Just look and many of them will be found. Awareness is the first part of any discovery. The joy of finding something that brings joy to others, as well as the finder, is a gift no one wants to miss.
~Written by MW Team Writer: John Davis
John William Davis is a retired US Army counterintelligence officer and linguist. As a linguist, Mr. Davis learned five languages, the better to serve in his counterintelligence jobs during some 14 years overseas. He served in West Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands during the Cold War. There he was active in investigations directed against the Communist espionage services of the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact. His mission was also to investigate terrorists such as the Red Army Faction in Germany, the Red Brigades in Italy, and the Combatant Communist Cells (in Belgium) among a host of others.
His work during the Cold War and the bitter aftermath led him to write Rainy Street Stories, ‘Reflections on Secret Wars, Terrorism, and Espionage’. He wanted to talk about not only the events themselves, but also the moral and human aspects of the secret world as well.
Click to Read John’s Complete Profile
Great story John. I agree that treasures are all around us, if you look. I like stories that sparks the mind. You’ve done a great job sparking mine.
I have some old civil war letters also. They are kinda hard to read because the penmanship used was a lot fancier than penmanship of today. I remember in one letter they were talking about the “copperheads “. After research I realized that the “copperheads “ were people who fought with both sides depending on whom they were surrounded by at the time. And were considered dangerous to both sides because most of the time the “copperheads “ could not be identified…
Now I want to go back and read more of those civil war letters… lol
Have a great day John and thanks again….. until next time… see ya
Please tell me which military units are mentioned in the letters! I’m sure there are historians who would be happy to help out if the units fell in their area of interest.
Good article, John.
I’ve told the story around these parts before of the letters I grabbed when I was a young fella.
It was an old house scheduled to be torn down by the company my father worked for. Employees were allowed to go in and salvage before the destruction.
It was the house of a once wealthy family that owned a brewery that went under because of Prohibition. It had marvelous woodwork, a floor made and fitted by hand in checkered woods that was really something, just a few fittings left of some antique quality. That was about it.
Until I found an old box full of old letters. I was surprised that no one else thought to take them, even just for interest in that family’s story. My father agreed that someone should take them and let me do the deed.
(Why do we appreciate our fathers so much more when we get older?)
There’s some very interesting family stories in those correspondences, letters sent from around the world, some pretty cool embossed letterheads, and some really cool fold-out post cards and the like.
And our local community has been building up the local historical community. I’ve checked the web site and I see pictures of old business letterheads and see that I have some they’d be interested in.
There’s also some pre-WWII pamphlets (they appear to be a sort of publication by some “guild”, maybe a church, or an association for brewers?) written in German, which might be very interesting.
I’ve checked out the stamps and they are very common and not worth anything. But the contents are at least historically interesting to the local effort.
And those embossed letterheads are from hotels from bug cities like Chicago and San Fransisco. Just a few of them. Those might be worth something.
And there is one particular post card thing that’s like a booklet of pictures of local Chicago buildings. That one might be worth something too.
But I’m not getting my hopes up for a windfall, lol.
I still have some research to do on that stuff. It’s interesting as much as anything else. A microscope into the past.
Thanks, Bob. I’d love to see those letters in German. I’m a German linguist….and my dad worked at a Brewery all his life!