I had dinner with friends tonight. One of the people at the table use to work for me in my former life. Her dad owned and operated a local barbershop for many decades. He has long since passed. She told me how her Dad and Mother collected hundreds of antique razors, mugs and other shaving items over the many years. They use to display much of the collection in the barbershop. The barbershop is still operating under their ownership but with hired barbers. All the antiques have been stored away in boxes - (many boxes) as she said. It was obviously very sentimental to her and I didn't want to be too intrusive. I did say that it would be wonderful just to see some of his great collection. We'll see. I'm not going to be able to sleep tonight thinking about this and what might be in those boxes.
I collect antique firearms among other hobbies. They say that at any given time only about 10% of the existing antique firearms are in circulation. The rest are sitting in someone's attic, or garage or basement. People saying "Oh that's just Grandpa's old gun - I'm sure its not worth anything". Heck - it is worth something and maybe something really big. I have no doubt the same percentages are in play with antique shaving memorabilia.
If the barber collected the stuff, it might be very good stuff indeed. ...If it's just stuff his customers gave him over the years, then 90% of it is likely to be junk. But that doesn't sound like that's what happened.
She told me that her Mother actually was the one who purposely bought most of the items over the years as gifts to her husband. We should all have such a wife. I imagine it is probably a pretty good collection.
My fiancée bought me a Wolf Whiskers brush for my birthday. I'd say mine is well on the way to being that kind of wife. If I'm half as good of a husband, I'll be a happy man.
I hope you were able to get some sleep. Such a shame for any collection to be stored away in boxes especially one like this Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Would it be rude to take a few pictures? It would be very interesting to see what's in the collection.
She didn't invite me to look at the collection - yet. We'll see what happens. I told her that she should at least get it evaluated for insurance purposes if nothing else.
Man, that is a find and a half. Congratulations! It is like the straight razor version of MTgrayling's bucket of safety razors. Please do post pictures, as it would be great to see such a haul. Such finds also serve to remind and encourage folks that there are still a ton of undiscovered gems waiting to be found. And sometimes a razor Sutton Hoo treasure, too. The barbershop where I used to go had around 30 straight razors mounted on the wall. It was later remodeled and modernized, sans razors. Those razors are probably stored away somewhere just like the ones you came across.
We do dinner every so often so I'm just going to let it sit for now and politely mention it again at the next dinner.