Pawn Shop Finds

As many of you know, I work at a Pawn/Antique shop, and in addition to the wicked cool stuff we get in that will go up for sale, sometimes we get stuff that won't. Among these are some papers I found in an old Funk and Wagnalls dictionary:

I wonder who she means by Pat or Rick?

I looked up the Edith Doll, which was popular in the late 50's.

This is a resume from 1958 from a man who was 33 years old, graduated from MIT (class of '46 with a degree in Electrical Engineering), and had a wife and three kids. I wonder if he got the job. Maybe the dear Santa letters were written by his daughters...

This last was among a bunch of books that had never gotten priced and it caught my eye

How cool is that?

I started reading and decided I had to have it, and oh boy is it interesting. After a brief introduction to the time and place - Northern France, 1220 - the reader is introduced to the castle, and its defensibility. One of my favorite passages is this:

"Even if the foe should cross the moat, shatter the portcullis, and split open the heavy doors, he would merely be at the beginning of terrible hours of ax- and sword-play. He would be in a narrow and low vaulted passage, with many loopholes on either side for archers, and also with slits in the ceiling for pouring down boiling oil, seething pitch, molten lead, and other pleasantries; and if he rushed past all these forms of death into the courts, there, behind him, capable still of very stout defense, would rise the two strong gate towers, rendering every attempt to reinforce the original attacking party a dice-throwing with death...

Good times.

Anyway, fascinating book, describing in detail what people ate, what they wore, how they celebrated, and what life was like in a place like this at that time. My mind is whirring away...how can I use this?

Happy Hump Day and I'll be back on Friday with a review of The Star-Touched Queen for the Cephalopod Coffee House.