While Boston is very rich in history and culture, most people don't expect to find artifacts dating from the 1800s inside the walls of their homes.
Nick Murphy was one of those people, until he began to renovate his parents' home in Winthrop and found glimpses to the past hiding in the ceiling.
Some of the items Murphy found included door hinges, a comb and personal items such as letters and a dance card.
"I started pulling the ceiling down and I noticed newspaper clippings coming down with it," said Murphy.
One of the items, a dance card, was written out when Chester Arthur was president of the United States.
"1884, this was held by somebody who was actually going to attend a ball," said Murphy.
Another letter, decades apart from the dance card, was written in 1942 and details the interactions between a brother and a sister.
"That letter is from the World War II era and it’s between a brother and a sister," said Murphy. The sister's name is Edith and that's who it is addressed to. It’s talking about getting Edith out of WW2 and out of the navy and it talks about the impending surrender of the Germans and the Japanese."
Murphy says he doesn't know if these items belonged to people who once lived in his parents' home, but know these items all come with a story that he hopes will live on.
"For us, it’s this preserved piece of history, but for them it was their actual day to day life - it was just interesting to find it," said Murphy.
Murphy says that after he's done with renovating the room, his next project will be to frame up all those items and hang them on the walls of that room as a tribute.
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