The YouTube algorithm is a strange and terrifying beast, but it’s been entertaining me recently with clips from Pawn Stars episodes. I’ve seen episodes about Beatles memorabilia, an amazing vintage plane, and a poker cheat’s tools from the 1920s. If it’s a well-documented piece, or a family heirloom, the sellers can give both personal and historical context to the objects, but, usually, we can only imagine what sights and sounds the item has been privy to over the decades.
In college, I had the privilege to live in a historic campus dorm known to the administration as “The Dow House,” but affectionately called, in a nod to its onetime owners, “The Paul House” by students. This two-story Victorian home was a fascinating collection of rooms, many of which were covered in layers of wallpaper. Before my junior year, the college gave my family permission to repaint and redecorate some of the main rooms, and during our wallpaper-scraping spree, we discovered, penciled on the wall behind layer No. 3, a company name and date from 1920. If only these walls could talk!
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