An interesting type of book scraper which I haven’t seen before hese are hinged so they can be kept upright and out of the way when not being used Chained to the corner of the door  

I didn’t find many old manhole covers in Stockholm, and the ones that I did find were all connected to the telecommunications infrastructure, in particular, from the company Rikstelefon (see also Rikstelefon’s phone booths and markers). This one dates from 1909 – it is similar to Swedish-made manhole cover that […]

There are quite a few of these Rikstelefon markers in Stockholm. Rikstelefon was a brand of Televerket, which was a Swedish government agency responsible for telecommunications from 1853 to 1993. The makers include numbers and an arrow so I assume they point to a manhole cover or something else that […]

A few old Rikstelefon phone booths can still be found in Stockholm. Rikstelefon was a brand of Televerket, which was a Swedish government agency responsible for telecommunications from 1853 to 1993. Other traces of this company can be found around Stockholm on manhole covers and markers. Rikstelefon means that the […]

Many of Stockholm’s old buildings, especially in the Old Town, used to serve as storehouses/merchants’ houses, and thus remnants of the hoist systems can still be found.

A sampling of Stockholm’s various kinds of guard stones. Stone Cannon Pipes Finding these only confirmed that the cannon that I saw in Riga were indeed used as guard stones Next to this cannon is a rune stone, which is 1,000 years old. More info about it here. Metal

Most of the buildings in Stockholm’s Old Town are still adorned with fire marks – plaques that showed that a building was insured in case of a fire. The signs, which depict a phoenix rising from the flames, were introduced in the 1740s. In the event of a fire, the fire brigade would […]

Stockholm has a wide range of anchor plates — of all shapes and sizes, spanning back at least to the seventeenth century. My favorite is the one that looks like an owl: A collage of the various kinds of plates that can be found in Stockholm:  I found several examples […]

The first houses in Winnetka were built in 1836.  Few of the nineteenth-century houses remain. The oldest surviving house is the Schmidt-Burnham House, which was built c. 1837. This one is now a museum. This red one was recently torn down 🙁

In the 18th and 19th centuries, mounting blocks were common in cities, towns, and villages. Usually made of stone, they were installed in key locations, usually near inns, churches, country houses, to aid mounting or dismounting a horse, carriage, stagecoach, etc. The more elabarote mounting blocks are called carriage steps […]