A few weeks ago I received a glossy oversized flyer in the mail, advertising a silver and gold buy in Hunt Valley. BACK BY POPULAR I have some silver and gold I dug up during my downsizing adventures here at Casa del Garrett that I inherited from mom that I didn’t think was a good fit for the Greensburg Historical Society since it didn’t directly relate to mom or that part of Pennsylvania; not very much but enough I thought I could get a few hundred bucks for it maybe. So when I got a flyer in the mail advertising a gold and silver buying event…

BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND! GOLD BREAKS THE 4K MARK!
WE BUY NO MATTER THE CONDITION!

…I decided to go see what they’d offer for it.

It was a big oversized glossy flyer, so I was expecting some sort of large venue with tables and buyers to look over what was being offered. And a big line since it was BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND!

What I found when I got there was it was being held in a small office suite with nothing at all to suggest it was even being held at that address, other than the security guard in the lobby who knew it was happening and directed me to the right floor. There was nobody at the front desk to check me in.

So I wandered around for a bit and eventually a young lady appeared from the outer hallway. I’m guessing she’d just taken a bathroom break. I showed her the flyer I was mailed. She looked at me very seriously and told me there was only one buyer and I might have to wait as long as an hour and a half or two hours to see him.

I thanked her and walked away. I think I know what was going on…do you?

Big glossy advertisement. GOLD BREAKS THE 4K MARK! WE BUY NO MATTER THE CONDITION! Yeah. Yeah. There’s the bait. Someone willing to sit and wait for up to two hours to have their stuff appraised is probably desperate enough to take whatever they’re offered.

Or they’re bringing them stolen goods, and maybe this is a sting of some sort.

I don’t know, and I don’t care. Even if I was desperate for money I wouldn’t touch something like this because I’m either likely to be cheated or investigated. So it’s all back in my safe, all but the two 24 carat gold rings I found with the letters LBC on them and the date 1913. Those are mysterious enough I might let the Historical Society look them over. Near as I can research it, the rings either indicate they belonged to a Women’s Co-ed branch of the Independent Order of Foresters, a Fraternal society popular across Pennsylvania in 1913, or the Lackawanna Business College of Scranton. I cannot pin down who in the family would have been associated with either but it would be interesting to know more.