The previous owners of this piece of land had a logging business that had gone bankrupt, and they had an estate auction to pay the bills. For the most part, this farm, which was homesteaded in 1904, is surprisingly bereft of old artifacts. That was until recently, when we cleaned out a loft area on an old building that had somehow gotten missed in the purge. Here are a few of our cool finds.

We found a variety of old newspapers lining boxes, from 1925 to the early 1950’s.

We found a total of 31 shoes, not all of them pairs, and ALL of them very worn. Wonder what they were saving them for?

The bottle on the left had the remains of a prescription on it, though the listing of the contents was lost. But whatever it was, it could be taken at up to 4 teaspoons a day.

The two boxes on the right are both for treating chickens. We have some indication that there was once a fairly substantial chicken farm here, something I plan to resurrect to some extent. The box on the left originally held sewing needles, and when found contained a piece of crayon and some broken mirror. Either a voodoo ritual box or a child’s treasures?

Coeur d’Alene is just over the border in Idaho. I bet they no longer can apples there.

We found a lot of old wooden produce boxes. I’m in the process of cleaning them up. They will become display boxes for produce at the farmers markets next year. This cranberry box is one of my favorites.

There was a box of boxes, which we determined were wooden berry boxes. Unfortunately, not in good enough shape to salvage.

This old baking powder tin contained strange colored rings similar to a key chain ring but smaller. I’m still trying to figure out what they are for.

This brown jug was in perfect shape. Wonder what it originally held? I’m going with Apple Jack, which is a liquor distilled from hard apple cider. Definitely a keeper!

Advertisement