# Strange things found in second hand books (and other items) **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [October 7, 2015, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852 "2015-10-07T19:43:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![movingfinger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@movingfinger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/movingfinger)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/21 "2015-10-08T06:36:54Z")
I bought a used copy of **Black Box** , a book of recorded final messages from airline crews who were doomed and knew it. In it was a boarding pass from a Southwest airlines flight from LA to the bay area. Does this mean the person who was flying bought a book about airplane crashes? To take with him on the flight? How weird is that? ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 6:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/22 "2015-10-08T06:50:41Z")
I bought most of my Lego collection second-hand from charity shops and on eBay - I always enjoyed sifting through to separate out the non-Lego items. Nearly always ordinary things like marbles, plastic soldiers, toy cars and random bits of board game, but the experience of finding them and picking them out takes me right back to memories of my childhood Lego collection, which contained its own unique assortment of alien objects. ---
**Author:** ![drpepper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/8baadc/32.png) [@drpepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drpepper)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/23 "2015-10-08T07:35:00Z")
> [@Lacunae\_Matata](#): > > I sort of collect vintage cookbooks. Several years ago, I was in a little town near an even smaller town where I’d lived for about 1.5 years as a child - found an awesome vintage cookbook at a little thrift store, nabbed it for a dollar or two, and went on my way. > > During the time we lived in the little nearby town, my father waged an unsuccessful battle with cancer - he was often in the hospital in the nearest city, my mom was away with him a lot, there was a revolving band of babysitters, etc. We had the dearest next-door neighbors - the Wilkeses were retired, no children of their own, but they welcomed three little kids from next door for after-school cookies or pound cake or pie and a little extra love. More than two decades later, when I got my new-to-me old cookbook home and started flipping through, the front half of an old envelope fluttered out. On the front was the name and address of our old neighbors, and on the back was Mrs. Wilkes’ chocolate pound cake recipe. I sat there and cried for a few minutes, then started reading - found lots of notes for Mrs. W’s favorite recipes, clippings of the same from newspapers, and so forth. The single best used item I’ve ever found. Wonderful story. ---
**Author:** ![Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mean_mr.mustard/32/3865_2.png) [@Mean\_Mr.Mustard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mean_Mr.Mustard)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 10:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/24 "2015-10-08T10:49:44Z")
Excellent thread idea. Best thing I’ve ever found was a piece of paper with a scrawled reminder of an upcoming colonoscopy appointment. The procedure was scheduled in 1980. Hope it went well. mmm ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/25 "2015-10-08T12:24:25Z")
I stopped at Giant Eagle on my way home to get . . . something. I forgot what I stopped for right after grabbing my shopping basket (I never use a cart) because the basket had a shopping list in it that caught my eye. Beautiful penmanship, plus a list that included things I would buy. I walked the aisles and tried to remember what I’d stopped for, but I wound up buying the eight or so things on the list. Peaches, a new toothbrush, and triscuits were three things I remember. My gf was a little worried about what I’d done, but that didn’t stop her from having a peach. ---
**Author:** ![BubbaDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bubbadog/32/333_2.png) [@BubbaDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BubbaDog)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/26 "2015-10-08T12:40:11Z")
> [@kayaker](#): > > I stopped at Giant Eagle on my way home to get . . . something. > > I forgot what I stopped for right after grabbing my shopping basket (I never use a cart) because the basket had a shopping list in it that caught my eye. Beautiful penmanship, plus a list that included things I would buy. > > I walked the aisles and tried to remember what I’d stopped for, but I wound up buying the eight or so things on the list. Peaches, a new toothbrush, and triscuits were three things I remember. My gf was a little worried about what I’d done, but that didn’t stop her from having a peach. I love this! Guy goes shopping. Forgets what he’s shopping for. Finds Shopping list. Uses said list. I got nothing to share for these types of experiences but this is a great thread. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/27 "2015-10-08T12:52:00Z")
I found a pledge card stating that the holder had given $2.50 toward the renovation of some church in Massachusetts or something and that they committed themselves to giving another $2.50 within six months. It was dated in the 1910’s, when you could actually get some decent work done with $2.50. ---
**Author:** ![JoseB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/joseb/32/1530_2.png) [@JoseB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JoseB)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/28 "2015-10-08T12:54:03Z")
> [@movingfinger](#): > > I bought a used copy of **Black Box** , a book of recorded final messages from airline crews who were doomed and knew it. In it was a boarding pass from a Southwest airlines flight from LA to the bay area. > > Does this mean the person who was flying bought a book about airplane crashes? To take with him on the flight? How weird is that? Weeeelp, that might have been me XD I have that exact same book, and, yes, I have taken it along when flying. I still remember reading it during the flight, and then have that feeling of “you are being watched”. I look up and I see that the person sitting next to me is looking at me and the book I am reading with a look of **extreme** concern in their eyes :o As to the topic of the thread… I once bought a book in a second-hand bookstore in Tokyo. A collection of short stories by several authors. The thing is that it was chock-full of annotations on the margins by some Japanese person who obviously had been using that book to study English and had been writing definitions of English words, explanations of turns of phrase, etc. Interestingly enough, those same annotations became very useful to me when I was studying Japanese 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/29 "2015-10-08T12:54:24Z")
A used copy of a [military reference book](http://www.amazon.com/Weapons-Tomorrow-Brian-Beckett/dp/0306413833), that had, on a chart of ICBM performance curves, a bunch of penciled in additions and corrections… According to the inside cover, the book formerly belonged to the on-site library of [Whiteman Air Force Base](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whiteman_Air_Force_Base), the home (at the time) to a Minuteman ICBM wing. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/30 "2015-10-08T13:00:26Z")
> [@Emtar\_KronJonDerSohn](#): > > I bought a pickup truck from a straight laced Mormon accountant who was liquidating hard to move items before moving to Quantico, VA to work as a g-man. There was a small amount of marijuana in a very small bag in the owner’s manual pouch. > [@Scumpup](#): > > I found a Spanish-made .45 caliber pistol under the seat of a beater pickup truck. When I lived in the Quad Cities years ago, a guy bought a pickup truck at a police department auction. The bed was filled with trash and junk which the cops hadn’t bothered to clean out. When the buyer emptied it, he found two dead bodies. :eek: Much P.D. embarrassment ensued. ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/31 "2015-10-08T13:14:00Z")
> [@Lacunae\_Matata](#): > > I sort of collect vintage cookbooks. Several years ago, I was in a little town near an even smaller town where I’d lived for about 1.5 years as a child - found an awesome vintage cookbook at a little thrift store, nabbed it for a dollar or two, and went on my way. > > During the time we lived in the little nearby town, my father waged an unsuccessful battle with cancer - he was often in the hospital in the nearest city, my mom was away with him a lot, there was a revolving band of babysitters, etc. We had the dearest next-door neighbors - the Wilkeses were retired, no children of their own, but they welcomed three little kids from next door for after-school cookies or pound cake or pie and a little extra love. More than two decades later, when I got my new-to-me old cookbook home and started flipping through, the front half of an old envelope fluttered out. On the front was the name and address of our old neighbors, and on the back was Mrs. Wilkes’ chocolate pound cake recipe. I sat there and cried for a few minutes, then started reading - found lots of notes for Mrs. W’s favorite recipes, clippings of the same from newspapers, and so forth. The single best used item I’ve ever found. Agreed - nice story! The first that comes to mind: my dad was a huge fan of Aldous Huxley. I was collecting first editions and so would look for old Huxley books while also searching for myself. I found a copy of a book collection of lectures he had given. I got it for a few bucks. When I got home, I realized that the book plate on the inside of it was that of famed Holloywood director George Cukor. A bit of research suggested that Cukor was fond of his library and friends with Huxley. My dad was really pleased. ---
**Author:** ![orderfire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/orderfire/32/10908_2.png) [@orderfire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/orderfire)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/32 "2015-10-08T13:31:35Z")
I don’t know if this really qualifies as a found object, but I thought it was cute. Many years ago I worked in a restaurant with a Persian guy named Machmoud. I was moving into a new apartment and he gave me a dresser that had belonged to his young sons. In the bottom of a drawer was a piece of butcher paper with a little plan-o-gram drawn on it in crayon - uneven boxes denoting where to place each type of clothing. Each section was labeled in that perfect semi-literate little kid handwriting: SOKS PANTS UNARWARE I kept it there for as long as I had the dresser because it cracked me up. “Unarware” LOL. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/33 "2015-10-08T13:57:33Z")
> [@PlainJain](#): > > I once did something quite outstanding with a person of note while in a building that might or might not have been a bookstore. I have since continued to revel in that glorious moment. Honestly, it was really amazing. Aw, gosh, I guess I took that corner too fast for PJ. Let me try again, real slow. I was in a bookstore. A very plain sort of used bookstore, not the kind that deals in first editions or rare books, just, you know, books that people didn’t want any more. In there, I found and bought a volume of literary criticism that’s a pretty well-known title in the field, a little famous even, by a critic whose name is even better known and a bit more famous. He had inscribed and dedicated the copy to a much more famous writer in the field, with kind words and flourishes. That famous writer (now concentrate, this is the tricky part) apparently didn’t think enough of the book or its author to hang onto it, or give it to some worthy destination like the repository of his papers, or a mutual friend, or even a bookstore that might have prized that copy and sold it at a premium price, but dumped the whole thing, inscription and all, into the stream of books no one wanted any more. Since I happened to have some professional connections to the critic (and knew the recipient author slightly) it was great fun to mention this under semi-embarrassing circumstances a few times over the years. I thought that qualified for “strange things found in second hand books.” I’m going to speed back up now, if that’s okay. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/34 "2015-10-08T14:05:57Z")
When I was really, really down and out, I took a book off the library frère shelf (where they put books even they don’t think they can sell). Inside was a sealed envelope containing a “bar mitzvah” card and $25 in cash! Act of God, indeed. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/35 "2015-10-08T14:21:53Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > I found a Spanish-made .45 caliber pistol under the seat of a beater pickup truck. The bluing was trashed. I refinished it and gave it to my brother who has it still, 15 years later. Sounds like the start of an episode of _Forensic Files_. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/36 "2015-10-08T14:25:13Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Sounds like the start of an episode of _Forensic Files_. 😃 “So, Mr. Pup, can you explain why you own a weapon used in the worst mob slaughter of the last half-century? Hmmm?” ---
**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:** [October 8, 2015, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/37 "2015-10-08T15:14:39Z")
Bought a wrecked car at an impound auction. Found a very petrified human finger laying on the floor next the the gas pedal. I’m guessing it belonged to the last person the drive the car, the dash was jammed up against the steering wheel. The county coroner’s office took it off my hands. Also found a 10,000 peso bill from a Central American country that escapes my mind right now. It was worth about $4 American. ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/38 "2015-10-08T15:48:03Z")
> [@racer72](#): > > Bought a wrecked car at an impound auction. Found a very petrified human finger laying on the floor next the the gas pedal. Please please let it have been the middle finger. When my grandmom passed away I received a number of her things, including a thick, old dictionary. I noticed something was slipped between the pages and opening it found a large, old B&W picture of a woman, obviously a family relative. But nobody in our family seems to know just who it was. My grandmom was an only child who’s parents died young while my granddad had eleven brothers and sisters in a very extended family. We’ve speculated and tried to look for resemblances but it’s still unsolved as to who this mystery ‘aunt’ would be. ---
**Author:** ![Kimballkid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b5a626/32.png) [@Kimballkid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimballkid)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/39 "2015-10-08T15:58:17Z")
> [@xizor](#): > > I bought a 10 year old Chevy Monte Carlo from a very vanilla looking insurance salesman. > In the trunk compartment where the spare tire and jack reside, I found brass knuckles, a ski mask, a machete and some bullets :eek: How do you fire bullets with a machete? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2015, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852/40 "2015-10-08T16:05:51Z")
> [@Kimballkid](#): > > How do you fire bullets with a machete? > > 😃 You put on the ski mask for protection, line them up along the blade of the machete jusssst soooooo, and do a Bruce Lee 1-inch punch at them wearing the brassies. Duh. 😃 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/strange-things-found-in-second-hand-books-and-other-items/733852.md?page=3)