# Odd things found in the rafters of the house. **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [March 23, 2006, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534 "2006-03-23T02:33:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/21 "2006-03-23T15:39:35Z")
We have an 86 year old house. in the attic we found a lot of junk-old cooking pots, utensils, etc. We also found a stash of old christmas cards 9unsent0 from the 1940’s-they were very high quality, but you could tell they were old (the edges of the pages were turing yellow. i have no idea why they were there-maybe the former inhabitants bout too many? We also found letters dating back to the 1940’s- I read a few of them…it made me kind of sad realizing that all of these people were long gone. ---
**Author:** ![TwoTrouts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a9adbd/32.png) [@TwoTrouts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwoTrouts)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/22 "2006-03-23T15:58:15Z")
Not something found, but something I left in an attic. Back in 1969, before we moved out of a small wonderful house, I stuck a treasure map that I had made behind a piece of wood in the attic. If anyone followed the map, they would find a small waterproof box buried under a flagstone. Inside, I had left all sorts of buffalo nickels, indian head pennies, mercury dimes and some Apollo space mission memorabilia… Oh, and some Hubert Humphrey for President buttons, etc. The house still exists in Arlington, VA. One day I’ll go by and see if the box is still there! ---
**Author:** ![Lissa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/23 "2006-03-23T17:00:10Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > She thought it was pretty, with all the detailed metal work and gold leaf, so she cleaned it of with Windex and shined it up with Lemon Pledge, and put it on a little pedestal on her mantelpiece. As someone who cleans artifacts in a museum for a living, this nearly gave me a stroke. Not only was cleaning the helmet with Windex a horrible, horrible idea, but Lemon Pledge is considered the Anti-Christ in the museum industry (or at least one of the Four Horsemen). ---
**Author:** ![Caffeine.addict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f475e1/32.png) [@Caffeine.addict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caffeine.addict)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/24 "2006-03-23T18:52:07Z")
> [@Little Nemo](#): > > Are you sure of the spelling? I used to live in Dansville, New York. Not really, I need to check them again. They were mostly pictures of houses. There was one called the Arions visit Dansville. The pictures and commission are in pretty bad shape. The old roof leaked so it was replaced last year, but the pictures had some significant water damage and were mildewy. > [@brian\_ax](#): > > Hey, it doesn’t hurt to ask: would you be willing to scan them and post them where we can see them? I may have access to a scanner this weekend. The warrant is incredibly fragile. What I would like to do is to frame the warrant. It is part of the house’s history. ---
**Author:** ![FairyChatMom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fairychatmom/32/21906_2.png) [@FairyChatMom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FairyChatMom)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/25 "2006-03-23T18:54:53Z")
I was just reminded that we left something behind in one of our former homes. We did a remodel and removed the sheetrock from one wall to expose the cinderblock garage wall behind. (We were cutting the corner of the garage and we figured it was easier to just strip all the old wallboard than try to match up old and new.) We let our daughter draw on the block with chalk - she was probably 6 at the time. Then we put up new sheetrock and finished the room. Perhaps some day, someone will take down that sheetrock and see her drawings. I hope we remembered to write down the date… ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/26 "2006-03-23T19:32:17Z")
Nothing interesting was left in this apartment- a box with some lightbulbs, and phone parts. The last house had a nice desk in the attic. You got into the attic through a hole in the wall of a closet. The owners had added some small steps and reinforced lip around the door. This made the opening too small to get the desk back out. We assumed the drawers were empty. When I finally checked, I found several x-rays of a rib cage, articles praising the previous owner for his work in the DEA, pictures of him with a President, and articles from French newspapers prasing him for another bust. The man had retired and moved to a smaller house. Before our family bought the place, his son was living there. He moved to prison when the police busted him for selling drugs and illegal guns. When we moved into my childhood home, the attic held a metal pheasant, and a Victorian style shoe used as a candleholder. When work was done on the kitchen, Mom found a wooden spoon. It’s painted gold and the end of the handle is engraved “Done by Grandpa Sellers in 1912 with a pen knife” When Mom and Dad moved to Florida, they found that the previous owner had left things in the panels of the kitchen ceiling- two glass swan candy dishes, and various other tacky antiques. Mom tried to return them to the next of kin, who either couldn’t be found or didn’t want them. The trove is worth a few hundred. ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/27 "2006-03-23T19:35:06Z")
> [@zoogirl](#): > > Also, when they were fixing up my church, they found newspapers that had been shoved in the walls for insulation when the place was built - 1912! Our house is from the late 1800s and we also had the old newspaper thing. However, we found it under the linolium in the closets and glued to the walls for wallpaper! They also glued cardboard to the walls, presumably for insulation. It WOULDN’T come off. I had to drywall over it. I’ve never been in the attic. I hear things scurrying around up there. I’m convinced it’s something spawned from evil. I just don’t have the nadage to look. ---
**Author:** ![metj](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/6a8cbe/32.png) [@metj](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/metj)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/28 "2006-03-23T19:45:35Z")
A unicycle ---
**Author:** ![Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/cc9497/32.png) [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/29 "2006-03-23T19:56:36Z")
My nextdoor neighbour found a gold sovereign and a shell from WW2 in his back garden. The shell was probably from a fighter plane, as we’re pretty close to both Manchester and Liverpool, which presumably were big targets for the Germans. We’ve never found anything interesting, although our walls used to be covered in wattle and daub which needed replacing with modern plaster when I was younger. Our house is a stone ex-miners cottage and around 250 years old. The pit head is in the back garden of the end house (completee with original pit head wheel). The mine runs directly under our house. When I was young, the mine started to subside, which caused the ECB to panic and send about ten cement mixers down to have it filled in 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Sternvogel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc79bd/32.png) [@Sternvogel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sternvogel)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/30 "2006-03-23T20:12:34Z")
> [@jimson](#): > > Chicken bone suspended by a string from one of the rafters. When I read this, it reminded me of the folk superstition that claims that evil can be warded off by concealment of certain objects during construction. Although [this article](http://j.w.d.home.comcast.net/whs/Shoes_in_the_Wall/shoes_in_the_wall.htm) focuses on shoes, it mentions that other objects – “even chicken and cat bones” – seem to have been cached for similar purposes. ---
**Author:** ![Caffeine.addict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f475e1/32.png) [@Caffeine.addict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caffeine.addict)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/31 "2006-03-23T20:13:21Z")
> [@Kalhoun](#): > > Our house is from the late 1800s and we also had the old newspaper thing. However, we found it under the linolium in the closets and glued to the walls for wallpaper! They also glued cardboard to the walls, presumably for insulation. It WOULDN’T come off. I had to drywall over it. > > I’ve never been in the attic. I hear things scurrying around up there. I’m convinced it’s something spawned from evil. I just don’t have the nadage to look. It’s probably mice. I have them too. I know we don’t have the old newspapers used for insulation since we just have plaster on brick. With a semi-detached rowhouse, this makes the exterior walls kind of cold to the touch. One of my neighbors found some victorian ceiling globes when she had insulation blown into her attic space. When digging in the yard, I’ve found old bottles and other such things. I also found some discarded syringes of a more recent vintage under the bushes in the front of the house. ---
**Author:** ![Miss\_Purl\_McKnittington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9a140/32.png) [@Miss\_Purl\_McKnittington](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Purl_McKnittington)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/32 "2006-03-23T21:35:21Z")
> [@Lissa](#): > > As someone who cleans artifacts in a museum for a living, this nearly gave me a stroke. Not only was cleaning the helmet with Windex a horrible, horrible idea, but Lemon Pledge is considered the Anti-Christ in the museum industry (or at least one of the Four Horsemen). Me too! (Well, except I don’t work in a museum or clean artifacts. I just like to collect antique textiles.) It reminded me of those people who talk about the lovely 1890s lace dress they found in an antique store, and it was just too pretty _not_ to wear, so they tried it on. And it was only a _little_ bit too tight and an inch or so too long, but it didn’t matter – they looked great! So they wore it to a picnic. In August. And it was so _hot_! But it didn’t matter because they just dropped a couple of ice cubes down their shirtfront. _hyperventilates_ Okay, that might be an exaggeration, but Edwardian clothing isn’t for wearing to picnics in August! ---
**Author:** ![Lissa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2006, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/33 "2006-03-23T22:22:17Z")
> [@Miss Purl McKnittington](#): > > Me too! (Well, except I don’t work in a museum or clean artifacts. I just like to collect antique textiles.) It reminded me of those people who talk about the lovely 1890s lace dress they found in an antique store, and it was just too pretty _not_ to wear, so they tried it on. And it was only a _little_ bit too tight and an inch or so too long, but it didn’t matter – they looked great! So they wore it to a picnic. In August. And it was so _hot_! But it didn’t matter because they just dropped a couple of ice cubes down their shirtfront. _hyperventilates_ > > Okay, that might be an exaggeration, but Edwardian clothing isn’t for wearing to picnics in August! In the early days of the museum, it was all run by volunteers who, while good intentioned, had no clue what they were doing. Our collection is one of the best in the country for a small museum-- some of our clothing items date back to the early 1700s. And the ladies who ran the place _used to put on “fashion shows” with them!_ Not only that, they noted in their logs when they took home some of our priceless quilts-- _to put them in the washing machine._ ---
**Author:** ![ryobserver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b2d939/32.png) [@ryobserver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ryobserver)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2006, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/34 "2006-03-24T00:11:29Z")
> [@Lissa](#): > > My grandmother used to buy old houses, fix them up and rent them out. We found all kinds of stuff when I was a kid. Once, they found $300 behind a cabinet, and finding old newspapers, bottles and odd junk stuffed into the walls was somewhat common. (Our guess was that the builders chucked their trash in there.) They probably did. Some crumpled newspapers and a 7-11 coffee cup would right now be entombed in my bedroom wall, where the plumber stuffed them, if I hadn’t removed them. ---
**Author:** ![ryobserver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b2d939/32.png) [@ryobserver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ryobserver)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2006, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/35 "2006-03-24T00:22:30Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > My favorite Antique Road Show moment was of a lady who found a spanish morion (like the kind the Conquistadores wore, with the fin across the top) shoved behind a beam in the house she bought. She thought it was pretty, with all the detailed metal work and gold leaf, so she cleaned it of with Windex and shined it up with Lemon Pledge, and put it on a little pedestal on her mantelpiece. > > Turns out it was authentic, some officer’s parade helmet from back in the day, and worth more than her house. I remember that too; it was a Philadelphia house. The helmet was Milanese, elaborately chased, and still had traces of its original gilding. How it came to be in a Philadelphia attic is anyone’s guess. I don’t remember anything about Windex or Lemon Pledge, though. I just remember various family members, mostly kids, had at various times worn the helmet as part of Halloween costumes. “Mostly kids” because the helmet was a bit small. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Goob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c77e96/32.png) [@Mr.Goob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Goob)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2006, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/36 "2006-03-24T00:33:50Z")
As a volunteer firefighter I was once at a controlled burn\* of a ramshackle 100+ year old brick house. We found a bunch of bones in one of the kitchen walls. Freaked some of us out, one looked like a thigh bone. A few guys swear it was from an animal but some of us were ready to call in police. \*Controlled burns are so much fun. Light it on fire put it out. Lather rinse and repeat. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2006, 12:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/37 "2006-03-24T00:50:32Z")
> [@Dominic Mulligan](#): > > My nextdoor neighbour found a gold sovereign and a shell from WW2 in his back garden. The shell was probably from a fighter plane, as we’re pretty close to both Manchester and Liverpool, which presumably were big targets for the Germans. 😕😕😕😕😕 Please define what you mean by “shell”. A “shell” implies a complete artillery round, **which is very, very dangerous!!** Get rid of it! A “shell casing” would be the brass section of an artillery round, left over after it is fired. Safe & harmless. Do you mean a round of machine gun ammunition? Or an autocannon round? If they are complete **they are still live**! Call your local police immediately. The brass alone is harmless. Or did you mean the shell of an airplane? The monocoque outer structure of an aircraft, _sans_ engine & wings? Or, did you mean…an unexploded bomb? :eek: :eek: :eek: :eek: :eek: ---
**Author:** ![racer72](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/racer72/32/3075_2.png) [@racer72](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/racer72)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2006, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/38 "2006-03-24T01:04:00Z")
The remains of a long expired kitty cat. It was just some fur and bones. ---
**Author:** ![Br\_er\_Lapin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e79b87/32.png) [@Br\_er\_Lapin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Br_er_Lapin)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2006, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/39 "2006-03-24T02:33:36Z")
When my family moved into our house when I was about 11, the realtor warned us that the previous owner, a very elderly man with a slew of medical problems, had hidden some kind of gun somewhere in the house, but then forgotten where. We never found it. I wonder if it’ll pop up some day, or if it just never existed. We did, however, find an semi-rotted parasol hidden away in the attic, and [this](http://www.redrae.addr.com/photos/horse.jpg) nailed to the wall behind the tacky faux-wood panelling. There were also tons of cool glass bottles in the random storage cubby under the steps to the back door, and every once in a while the dogs dig some more bottles up out of the backyard. ---
**Author:** ![Caffeine.addict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f475e1/32.png) [@Caffeine.addict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caffeine.addict)\ **Post date:** [March 24, 2006, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534/40 "2006-03-24T15:50:58Z")
This reminds me of a row house, I looked at in Petworth. This place had never been remodeled and had been built around 1910. In the closet, they still had the original wallpaper. The kitchen looked like it was from the 1930s, and the bathroom had the original tile and fixtures. The place had been pretty well maintained but had no A/C and I couldn’t live in DC without A/C. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/odd-things-found-in-the-rafters-of-the-house/349534.md?page=3)