Sunday, April 22, 2007

Found



I found the above item today, sticking out between a wall of my house and a waist-high shelving unit just inside the front door. Untattered, it would likely measure 13/16" x 15/16". My guess is that it was left atop the shelving unit (still a great place for leaving almost anything -- change, bills, keys, concert programs, sunglasses, junk mail -- you get the idea) and somehow got swept down into the fraction of an inch between shelf and wall. My other guess is that years of vibrations from footsteps and the front door finally helped bring this small item back into view. I think its reappearance must be recent: my family has lived in this house since 1991, and no one had ever noticed this bit of paper before.

Tearing out old walls, my dad the tileman sometimes found great bits of ephemera. The best: an old Chesterfield package, in perfect shape, minus cellophane, minus cigarettes.

The Chicago Daily News? Wikipedia describes it as an afternoon daily, published from 1876 to 1978.

It just occurred to me that "great bits of ephemera" might be considered redundant. To my mind, any bit of ephemera is great.

Invitation to a dance (On another bit of ephemera)

No job too small (More on Leddy Ceramic Tile)

comments: 2

Anonymous said...

The Daily News is a fond memory of my childhood and adolescence, since my father brought it home every night from work (he bought it on the way to the station and read it on the train). This great newspaper was not only the original home of Mike Royko, but its Thursday crossword puzzle was a completely blank grid: no numbers, no black squares.

Michael Leddy said...

Great memory, Norman. Thanks for sharing it.