Scored something interesting today - but it smells a bit musty...

[sin-n-dex]

I took a trip to the coin store today, and found a box with a "free" sign out front of the shop with various junk they were trying to get rid of (because the back room is totally cluttered, there are tons of binders and albums with collections that haven't even been looked at since they were purchased a few years ago).

They finally dealt with the coins, and threw the albums in the box outside. I scored some Whitman blue cardboard albums that were issued between 1958 and 1961. I left anything too damaged, but what I took was in pretty clean and neat condition, and the worst problem was a bit of pencil marking where the collector wrote years on the album (for coins that were not issued at the time the album was made).

That wasn't what I thought was the best part of this score...

I found some Coinmaster and Uni-Master albums (by Uni-Safe), although they were for Canadian coins. From looking at these albums they were made in 1980, and they looked like they could accommodate coins to about year 2000 without adding extra pages (and extra pages are available, or at least they were...)

But when I got them home... I realized that some of them smelt pretty musty. I used a damp cloth to wipe down the vinyl to remove any dirt. I noticed a couple of them smelt like pinesol (as if someone was trying to clean them), it was pretty pronounced when I smelt it up close. Not really sure what I can do about this, aside from tell buyers the albums look nice but they stink. (You have to be pretty close to it to smell it, but if I picked up on it while photographing them, then it's noticeable enough that I need to tell my potential buyers).

They were in reasonably good shape aside from the smell (for being used, and the guy who's collection was in them stopped collecting in 1995, they must have come in as part of an estate sale).

I might not be looking this up right, but I have not found a single Uni-safe album that resembles what I got today. I feel the albums I got were truly vintage (and it was the coin shop's trash, they were giving them away). I got a bunch of other supplies from the trash box as well, including two catalogs that I don't have at home which will help me identify things. (They are dated though, so prices won't be correct, but I never used a catalog to price anything anyway).

C.

[southern*sweet*tea]

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@varebelrose wrote:

Put them in a closed plastic tote box with baking soda for a week or so, and try to leave pages "fanned" open if possible.

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^^^THIS^^^

Or use unscented clay cat litter.  Both baking soda and cat litter work wonders to remove odors. I've saved many a beautiful but musty piece of paper this way.  The smell will not come back, UNLESS you have mildew. If you have mildew, it can be removed, but the removal process (unless you let a professional do it) can ruin the piece.   Anything with mildew, no matter how slight, I toss.

[katzrul15]

Never thought about using cat litter.  We don't buy the scented, but could.  Thanks for the tip. still struggling with some of MILs things with musty smell - especially yearbooks, cookbooks, etc

[sin-n-dex]

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@southern*sweet*tea wrote:

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@varebelrose wrote:

Put them in a closed plastic tote box with baking soda for a week or so, and try to leave pages "fanned" open if possible.

---

^^^THIS^^^

Or use unscented clay cat litter.  Both baking soda and cat litter work wonders to remove odors. I've saved many a beautiful but musty piece of paper this way.  The smell will not come back, UNLESS you have mildew. If you have mildew, it can be removed, but the removal process (unless you let a professional do it) can ruin the piece.   Anything with mildew, no matter how slight, I toss.

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The two I tossed I'm pretty sure had mildew. The plastic was darkened and discoloured a bit inside and it smelt pretty bad. I just tossed those.

The others seem to be OK. I had them together as a group and couldn't determine where the smell was coming from. I had assumed it was all the same collection but we may have gotten the albums from a few different collectors.

C.