postcards, old negatives and ephemera

[PeterW]

Hi everyone,

This morning at Ashford car boot sale and general junk market I had a spot of luck and picked up two boxes. One contains about two hundred to two hundred and fifty old postcards, most of them dating from about 1900 to about 1925 and mostly scenes from the mainland of Europe. The other has about 50 or 55 old family negatives, some 120 and some 116 also, I think without close examination, from the same period. Plus masses of ephemera such as birth certificates, death certificates and other stuff dating from about 1883 to again the 1920s or early 1930s. I think it may have been someone's collection for researching a family history.

The dealer from whom I got them knows of my interest in such things and saved the boxes under the stall for me. At a dedicated postcard and ephemera collectors fair I estimate they would be offered at around eight to ten times what I gave for them.

I looked through them only briefly on the stall. I shall have hours of interest going through them in detail.

Peter W

[Randy]

You'll be like a kid in a candy shop Peter.

[Just Plain Curt]

Sounds like a great score there Peter. Personally I find all those things fascinating myself. Hope you get hours of enjoyment plus as you say, there's always a resale value too. Good to see you're out and about. Take care. Curt

[SidW]

Fascinating find Peter. Since it's all of a similar age, it could be a cleared attic etc. unless you actually saw lists of names and family trees. Were the certificates originals from the time (with stamps etc) or recent issues (more recent date). My I ask what the surnames were? My people originate in the area north of Ashford. Off list if you like.

[photax]

Hi Peter !

A great find ! I`m pleased for you. I also purchase boxes full of negatives on the fleamarket from time to time ( if the price is alright ). Some people find them at apartment liquidations or in grandfathers basement and sell them for a few Euros, just to avoid to take them back home again. And some times there are negatives, or glass plates from the turn of the century, WWI or WWII, cars, trains or Zeppelins among them. I scan them with an 8 or 9 years old Agfa-Duo-Scan ( bought a year ago for 70.- Euro ). This large and heavy monster is really slow indeed, but takes all kind of negatives up to 22x36cm.

MIK

[PeterW]

Thanks, everyone.

I've been going through some of the old negatives and they can be divided into two groups, one group taken by a keen photographer with a decent quality camera, the other typical blurred snapshots possibly from a box camera some showing lots of camera shake and others really underexposed.

No-one tok care of the negs, they were just stuffed into envelopes and some of them have bad rubs and scatches. They are all covered in dust and fingerprints.

I've started cleaning some of what look quite interesting using cine film cleaner but they still needed quite of lot of spotting-in after scanning. I think it was worth the trouble. Here are some examples:


Edwardian Gentleman


A stroll in the well-kept grounds WW1 period


A workman disconnecting the supply from a gas street lamp circa 1910 pauses in his work because ...


... everything stops for the tea break

Hope you enjoy them.
PeterW

[PeterW]

Sid,

Not much luck for you I'm sorry to say.

Some of the certificates are originals and others are certified copies, the most recent copy being dated 1954. It's difficult to read some of the older documents. They are very dog-eared and even torn, the handwriting is spidery and the iron-based ink has faded to a rusty orange.

The oldest member of the family mentioned seems to have been Thomas Magill. I don't know where or when he was born, but there is the original certificate of his election into the Grand Lodge of Ireland (Freemasons) dated "18th day of February in the Year of Masonry 5846". According to a site on the net there are several Masonic dating systems. As far as I can make out 5846 seems to be 1846.

He seems later to have moved to Liverpool as there is the original copy of his will, handwritten on a pre-printed form and dated 1887.

The surnames in the documents are:
Magill (Liverpool)
Calvert (Derby)
Clatsworthy (Plymouth)
Hodgkinson (Manchester, later Ilford, Essex).
Fletcher (Liverpool, died 1868)

There isn't, unfortunately, a family tree.

The documents found their way to Ashford as the dealer from whom I got them bought them some months ago at an auction somewhere down near Southampton.

Probably not a lot of help to you about your own family.

PeterW

[SidW]

Thank's Peter. It's amazing how stuff wanders about.