A few years ago - 13 years to be exact - I had the opportunity to take some video of a long-abandoned house out in the country. The owner was giving me a couple of antique TV's and while there, allowed me to tour the place. I recently watched that video for the first time in years, and was quite surprised, and disturbed, at the number of valuable antiques that had been left there to decay. The house is still standing, but is beginning to collapse on one side. The owner, now in his 80's, refuses to let anyone on the property anymore, citing concerns over safety, but personally I think it's because he's upset about a number of break-ins over the years. To my knowledge, most of the antiques are still there, and leaving them in this old place is a tremendous risk. How the building has avoided arson in the 45 years it's been vacant is remarkable, but even if somebody doesn't burn it, it will still eventually fall down and one way or another these valuable antiques will be lost.
I'm posting this message in the hopes someone can give me an estimated value of some of the antiques, or at least identify the manufacturers / models so I can do some more fruitful research. I want to present this information to the owner in the hopes that he'll come to his senses and at the very least move the stuff somewhere safer.
Below are some pictures (frame grabs from the aforementioned video) of some of the items for your examination:
The object on the refrigerator caught my eye - it looks like a vintage cookie jar, but I cannot identify the brand. It doesn't seem to be a King Cole, Tetley, or Humpty Dumpty jar, unless I didn't do enough research.
This beautiful old stove, cluttered with other vintage kitchen items, is probably the most valuable item here. I figure it has to be worth at least $1000, but unless someone can recognize the manufacturer, there's not much I can determine from this image.
Two old phonographs, one a console and the other a table model. No idea as to the make or model numbers.
This looks like quite an early Singer sewing machine, though I can't tell too much from this poor quality image.
Any info on this stuff would be appreciated. I doubt I can talk any sense into the owner, but perhaps some significant dollar figures might just make it through his thick skull. It's worth a try, at least.