<story><title>A $2 photo from a California junk shop is the ‘holy grail of Western Americana’</title><url>http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/10/15/why-experts-say-a-2-photo-from-a-california-junk-shop-is-the-holy-grail-of-western-americana/?postshare=4301444920218864</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>rokhayakebe</author><text>Now imagine, sometime, somewhere, someone got a written manuscript from Plato, or the Buddha, or another figure and just used it to make fire.</text></item><item><author>bloat</author><text>You must have pretty specialised knowledge to look at that photo in the junk shop and say to yourself, &amp;quot;You know, that might be Billy the Kid. I should get this appraised.&amp;quot;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>tpeo</author><text>There&amp;#x27;s no need to imagine. When Henry VIII ordered the supression of the monasteries, manuscripts from monastic libraries were sold as toilet paper and shining rags. Though this has less to do with unnapraised items being lost due to clulessness than with a monarch being a dick.</text></comment>
<story><title>A $2 photo from a California junk shop is the ‘holy grail of Western Americana’</title><url>http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/10/15/why-experts-say-a-2-photo-from-a-california-junk-shop-is-the-holy-grail-of-western-americana/?postshare=4301444920218864</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>rokhayakebe</author><text>Now imagine, sometime, somewhere, someone got a written manuscript from Plato, or the Buddha, or another figure and just used it to make fire.</text></item><item><author>bloat</author><text>You must have pretty specialised knowledge to look at that photo in the junk shop and say to yourself, &amp;quot;You know, that might be Billy the Kid. I should get this appraised.&amp;quot;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>dogma1138</author><text>That might be unfortunate, but we&amp;#x27;ve set fire to priceless manuscripts intentionally far more often.
&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Destruction_of_the_Library_of_Alexandria&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Destruction_of_the_Library_of_...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>