The Inspector wrote:
You also need to wonder how many albums and photos got pitched out after 'gramps' died and no one had any interest in old airplane pictures. I threw out two boxes of old family (I guess) photos after my parents died since neither one identified anyone on any but a very few of hundreds of very old photos and with no Aunts or Uncles to ask, they meant nothing to me beyond being 80+ year old BROWNIE pictures of people I didn't know and could never identify. Sad but I have enough of my own crap to drag around

While I was working on my History BA, I was a full time Garbage man. This was in the day when a garbage man actually lifted a can up and tipped it into the garbage truck hopper.
Anyways, I found several WWII histories in the trash. Numerous photos, letters and other items. ;
I have found photos of Bombing raids on Germany and Occupied Europe taken from a B-24;
I have found an history of a WWII USO dancer;
I have found photos and history of a WWII B-25 gunner shot down during invasion of Italy Sept 10, 1943;
I have found photos and letters of a famous English Chrildren's author (bombed out of her house in May 41) who had a pen pal in Chicago during WWII.
Not every garbage man has a background in social science, so I am sure that many histories and photos go into the land fill. Sad but True.
See the links in the message in this link to read about A/C George Bialis, who history was found in the garbage. Writer Bob Green wrote five columns in the Chicago Tribune about the young cadet, killed in an aviaiton accident in California in 1943.
http://pacaeropress.websitetoolbox.com/ ... AZ-5517515