I have some grinding stones/mortars that I helped dig out of an archeological site in Joradan. They are from approximately 600 b.c.e. They are not particularly rare or remarkable in any way, which is why I was allowed to keep them, but I think they are pretty cool.
I also have a few other artifacts from that dig. I was not able to bring back the ring or any of the seals we dug up.
My dad's WWII steel pot helmet from his days as a Marine. It features a hole from a sniper's bullet that somehow managed not to kill him.
Heat shield tile from the space shuttle program. The number on it and a detailed assembly drawing indicates exactly where it would have been installed. Unfortunately it was not used on a shuttle in space flight.
I also have a newspaper clipping about my grandfather’s brother being arrested for bootlegging in the 1920s.
My greatest historical possession is a picture of me and Abe Lincoln watching Lee’s surrender at Appomattox on TV in the Oval Office.
fisky wrote:
While living in Greece, I explored an excavation for a new building and dug out several pottery shards that were still embedded in the dirt sidewall of the excavation. Based on pottery with similar markings, they are about 2,500 years old. I have them mounted in a shadow box.
Where in Greece? I lived in the town of Kastri, near Athens, in the vicinity of Nea Erythraia and Kifissia, from 1969 to 1973. It seemed that there were so many old ruins just lying around the countryside back then. (These days, I suspect that one could get into some trouble for trying to take various artifacts out of the country.)
Semper fi wrote:
Dad brought back his canteen from WW2. Canteen was “modified” by a Japanese bullet on Okinawa. I have his medals and uniform too.
My father dropped out of high school and joined the Navy to fight the Japanese when he turned seventeen, and eventually ended up in the Battle of Okinawa watching kamikazes flying toward him and seeing other kids being killed by "friendly fire" while they were bobbing in the ocean. How many would volunteer for such horrors these days? They'd be more likely to gripe about being denied college loan forgiveness and NCAA eligibility.
These are so cool
My dad also has a really heavy gold coin, not sure the vintage or how much gold
My father was a stamp collector. In one of the stamp magazines he received they would have auctions for stamps and other unusual items. This was before Al Gore invented the internet so you had to send in a letter with a bid. Anyway, some dude inherited an “autograph” collection and put it up for bid with almost no description.
My father put in a token bid and was surprised when he won. What he received was pretty damn cool. Over a period of almost 50 years a guy would write letters to all the yearly Nobel award winners. The letters were handwritten and identical and in these letters he’d congratulate the winners and enclose a self addressed return envelope asking for an autograph. He had dozens of autographs from these Nobel Prize winners. Some simply signed the letter and returned it while others wrote back really nice letters putting a lot of thought into them. The autographs ranged from Crick and Watson to Herman Hesse. I have no idea what they are worth, but I always thought it was a really interesting collection.
My father has a 18th century Spanish musket and several pistols apparently passed down for over 200 years in my family. Most people know muskets are pretty long but it is hard to appreciate how massive a 5ft long gun is until you hold it. He owned these guns illegally as they still technically function and he didn't want go through the paper work of registering them or breaking the firing mechanism.
I don't have anything as interesting as what has been posted. The best I have are a few books printed in 1820s-1830s and some atlases printed in the 1890s.
We have a family archive that dates back to the 12th century, there are a few pretty cool documents in it.
Track program signed by Steve Prefontaine
I found a nazi coin while running
Avocado's Number wrote:
Semper fi wrote:
Dad brought back his canteen from WW2. Canteen was “modified” by a Japanese bullet on Okinawa. I have his medals and uniform too.
My father dropped out of high school and joined the Navy to fight the Japanese when he turned seventeen, and eventually ended up in the Battle of Okinawa watching kamikazes flying toward him and seeing other kids being killed by "friendly fire" while they were bobbing in the ocean. How many would volunteer for such horrors these days? They'd be more likely to gripe about being denied college loan forgiveness and NCAA eligibility.
You had a good post going until you climbed up on the soap box
A couple of letters Justice William O. Douglas wrote to my dad in the late 50's.
HRE wrote:
genuine wrote:
Nazi flag that my great grandfather stole from a town-square some-time after D-day. Obviously not on display (because my family is firmly anti-nazi); It's folded in a box in the attic.
My dad also got one of those from a city hall in a Belgian town his unit liberated. He also got a Wehrmacht helmet. Ours is in a chest in the cellar.
Is it weird how we hold on to Nazi memorabilia?
from my deceased grandfather: pair of service daggers from WW2 sturmabteilungs / brownshirts that he "liberated" during his time of service. Inscribed with "Alles Fur Deutschland" and nazi eagle / swastika.
from my deceased great grandfather who was the honorary physician to the royal family: stool from the coronation of England's King George VI
Weird? Maybe. To me it's not so much Nazi memorabilia as my dad's memorabilia. He was very proud of his time with Patton and those things remind me that he did that. I also have an army jacket of his for the same reason.
We have an Indian grinding rock on our ranch.
We have a football signed by Tony Dorsett, Earl Cambell and Kenneth Sims.
I have a Mickey Mantle signed Baseball.........Reggie Jackson too...
Sadly, I have nothing and I'm not really aware of anything that my parents or grand-parents might have that are of interest.
I know there are a couple of really old rifles that my grandfather had, and they might be from his father or even great-grandfather. I'd really like to have those. I do a lot of ancestry and I'd like to have some physical connection to the past, no matter how "worthless" they might be monitarily.