Unusual things in your homes...

[cjt110]

Reading an article about unusual things people have found in their homes such as milk doors (who knew they ever existed!), mouseholes and electric switches.

What things have you had in your home...

We lived in a big house that was previously a manor type home but was divided into 10 flats. The cellar was as big as the floorplan of the house and inside had meat hooks, a stone slab table for cutting the meat, a stone carved wine cellar and a coal chute. Amazing to look at and see. And the old plans were fascinating. Turns out our flat was the lady of the house's bedroom and dressing room and the man had his own bedroom and dressing room too. The grounds had an unusual flat lawn which had previously had a tennis court on and they had also had an orchard of some kind.

Our home now is a newish build (2006) and on accessing the toilet cistern we discovered all sorts of sketches on the wooden plinth from the builders... mainly looked work related but had the obligatory "Matt woz 'ere" scrawled on it too!

Current house (although we've had it in previous housing too-military housing)... Sinks in bedrooms. Half useful, half a pain.

House we own... Victorian terrace. It has a four room cellar- one of which was obviously the kitchen at some point. It still has the proper range cooker in (but non functional). Two others are the coal cellar and pantry, but not sure what the fourths function was.

Most people will consider our curtains rather odd too... But that's the MOD for you. Best was the time we had matching green curtains and sofas... Plus carpet in s a different shade of green, with the other provided furniture stained very dark brown.

We have a large gong. I'm going to offer to bong it for Brexit if Boris will give me half a million.

When I bought a new washing machine a couple of years ago I found a molar tooth on the floor underneath the old one when I pulled it out. I’d owned the flat almost a decade at the time, and had thoroughly cleaned everything and bought a new washing machine shortly after I moved in. I have no idea where the tooth came from or whether it was human (certainly looked it) or animal, but can only assume moving the washing machine the second time dislodged it from somewhere weird.

I also have a strange and gruesome clay Maori figurine which is also supposedly a musical instrument like an ocarina, though I can’t work out how on earth it makes sound. My half-Maori ex’s mother brought it with her as a gift for me when she visited. With a smile, she told me that it traditionally brought good spirits with it into the house of whoever received the gift; but break it or throw it away and those spirits would get angry and haunt you forevermore.

It lives behind glass in a display cabinet in my living room. I’m not generally superstitious but it’s going nowhere.

@Aroundtheworldin80moves Do you know why they put sinks in the bedrooms? I assume there may have been more than one soldier at a time in the residence so they had their own facilities?

@willothewispa is this ornamental or a feature in the house? did you bring it with you?

@ComtesseDeSpair We found an 18K white gold ring in our washer when we bought our place - a mans ring with 9 diamonds in it. The home had been a reposession and the door had been put through 18m before in an apparent drugs bust. The previous owner had been a notorious hard man/cage fighter and all the police found was protein powder.

The ring went some way to replacing the door and doorframe when we completed our purchase.

It lives behind glass in a display cabinet in my living room. It sounds like Annabelle

In our previous house we found a glass jar in the attic which was filled with nail clippings! Think of a regular sized mayo jar, jammed full of them!

And in our current house we have a cellar, which according to our neighbour, was originally double the size it is now, and that half of it was bricked up and was full of "stuff". DH knocked a few bricks through and found a ginormous room, sadly it was completely empty. But if we ever need a 40sq foot damp basement room, we just.to knock a bigger hole in the wall!

It's a feature but an ugly one. If the neighbours are on holiday I've been known to use it to stop arguing teens or announce dinner

I also have a strange and gruesome clay Maori figurine which is also supposedly a musical instrument like an ocarina,

Not sure without a picture but it could be a Nguru.

When I was a teen we moved into a cottage and when my parents stripped the wallpaper there were lots of very disturbing writing about “killing the bitch” and how someone (presumably a woman) had destroyed someone’s life. My Dad spoke to the previous owner who said that they had bought it from the estate of a man who had killed himself after his wife left him. He had done it on the railway lines behind the house!!

We found about a thousand Marvel comics from the 70s under the loft floorboards when we did our loft extension. We initially thought we must have made a fortune but actually on all they were worth about 1.5k for all of them.

We live in an old converted hospital (listed building I believe) and I only just realised the other week that in 5 yrs living here, theres about 8-10ft of unaccounted for space missing. I was walking through the hallway and realised my living room wall doesn't join the bedroom wall. How I've never noticed I do not know! I think its because the living room is so huge I never realised this chunk of space behind my storage cupboards. I wish I could find out whats in that space!

We have a 1913 house. We found old pipes boarded up using wooden packing crates advertising "Australian Rabbits". How on earth that would have got to England fresh I don't know!

Also found some superbly racist advertising for chocolate on an old newspaper inside the boarded up rails of the banisters.

I once found an unused postcard featuring a photo of Hitler at a rally in the middle of my hallway floor. I suspect it came from the inside of a second hand book as it was near my bookcase but I hadn't touched the books or seen anything fall out.

I don't know where it is now, I think I possibly threw it away as it creeped me out.

I found a lump of coprolite (dinosaur poo) in the garden. It is now on display on the dresser. Does that count?

Our kitchen has old meat hooks. And a pantry!! I love my pantry!!.
And old laundry shutes down 3 flights.
And old bells in most rooms as it was a school back in the 1800's..

Basins in bedrooms were quite popular in the 1970s. No one had en-suites in those days and I suppose this was a sort of half way house.

The house my grandparents lived in in the mid 60s (17th century terrace) had a massive mangle outside in a covered area of the courtyard. The rollers were really thick (about a foot I think). You couldn't use it for anything with buttons because the buttons always broke. I imagine they were very useful for sheets though.

In the 90s my mother had a flat in a beautiful building that used to be a mental hospital. I always wondered what had gone on in her bit.

Ceramic Catholic figurines ( Mary, Jesus) under the floorboards. (Is this a thing???)

In our previous house we found a letter to the record label that was based in the house, asking them to listen to their music demo. The letter was from the 70s. Did google the band but they never were published

The joists in our attic have various addresses scrawled on them. The previous owners had the roof completely redone, trusses replaced and more space made; so I’ve always assumed it was the details for the roofers next jobs!

Our current house had a series of pulleys on our bedroom ceiling connecting to a large pulley in the bay window. We removed them but speculation about what they were for became quite far-fetched.

We have a c1600 cottage. I found a well half in the dining room and half in the front garden, the house was built on top of it.

I found it when planting some daffodil bulbs and suddenly all the soil started to disappear

@willothewispa - I think you’re right! I googled and whilst mine is shaped like a figurine it has the same pattern of holes as those pictured, around the back.

Here he is, in his slightly menacing glory.

Thank-you!

Some years ago, we owned a 50s house. We were doing some renovations and removed the floorboards downstairs. Underneath was crammed with empty gin and whisky bottles. Hundreds of them.

A friend of mine lives in a very old converted hospital - when she had her floorings ripped up to have carpet put down she found channels carved out of the concrete in her bedroom, apparently her bedroom was the old operating theatre and through these channels would flow the blood 😬