|
| Monday, July 20, 2009 |
| Hiding Spaces |
I was moving some furniture around in my bedroom recently with the help of some carpet cleaners. We were not being particularly careful since we were mostly just holding up items for the cleaning machine to reach under and then setting them back down again. But one of the crew grabbed one of my small bedside tables and while moving it he tilted it. Suddenly the hidden drawer in the table opened, catching him off-guard.
The table used to belong to one of my great-aunts and came from the large three-family home my grandmother inherited from her parents (the home is still in the family, but now owned and rented out by my eldest sister). Thinking about the table got me thinking about my memories of that house and all of the hiding places the family used to store valuables. I dug into my photo albums and came up with two pictures which show two of the larger hiding spaces (you may need to click on the photo to see larger and read the text).
Just as the little table from that house had a "secret" drawer, so did the desk and even the sewing table. Thinking about why my family felt the need for all of these secret spaces brought to mind the Time magazine article: The Secret Stash and this quote: Wives have probably been hiding money from their husbands since marriage was invented. The Japanese have a special term for the secret funds: hesokuri, variously translated as belly-button money or spindle money. Before the revision of marital-property laws, a state-by-state process that took until the 1930s, American women had good reason to be stealthy about their hoards, says Princeton sociologist Viviana Zelizer, author of The Social Meaning Of Money . All household property legally belonged to their husbands. Zelizer tells of an early 20th century husband who got so tired of his wife's pinching coins from his trousers while he slept that he set a small rat trap in his pocket. Caught literally red-handed at 2 a.m., the wife filed charges against him the next day; but the judge dismissed them, upholding a husband's right to safeguard even his small change. I don't think the wives in the family were hiding money from the husbands in my case. Everyone in the family knew of the secret spaces. But we did not talk about them to people outside the family. Perhaps the hiding spaces are just a product of an older time when people distrusted banks. Or perhaps they felt the need to have certain items close at hand. Maybe it was as simple as "out of sight, out of mind" at least with the small on-hand amounts of money kept in some of the smaller hiding spaces. Kind of like when you forget you left a $20 bill in your winter coat pocket only to rediscover it once the season comes around again...
What about you? Any interesting hiding spaces you care to share in the comments? |
| posted by Boston Gal @ 8:04 AM *
* Subscribe to Boston Gal's Open Wallet |
Links to this post:
|
| 6 Comments: |
-
I love secret these types drawers and hidden panels when I see them in old furniture on Antiques Roadshow and such. Since most of my furniture comes from Ikea, I don't have those types of hiding places. What I do have is a large library of books where I can hide things-- money, documents, letters-- in appropriate books on my shelves. As an example, I usually keep a bit of emergency cash in a copy of Crime and Punishment. There's probably a bunch of stuff I've forgotten about too. Have to be careful when lending out books!
-
My grandparents had a secret cubby in the closet of my mother's childhood room. My grandfather had made a little space (probably 7" long by 3" high by 3" deep behind one of the cedar wall boards. You really had to know where it was to find it. I think it was originally intended as a fun little thing for my mom, but in later years it held my grandmother's amythest ring and the occasional easter chocolates to amuse the grandkids. We loved it!
-
I think a lot of people have a little hidden cash on hand. My husband knows I have some hidden, but doesn't know where or how much. (It's not much, honest!) It gives us both a little peace of mind that there's some cash in the house, but we know that the spendthrift won't be tempted to use it!
-
I can safely reveal this one because we're moving. We have a stash of cash above the opening to a closet. We lived in the house for about 6 years before this space was discovered. Only because our mischievous cat was found walking along the ledge! It's at least 4" deep and you just don't notice it.
-
We hid a safe in our house for our documents and bonds. My husband's friend used to buy whole "estates" years ago. He said he would always find cash hidden in books and usually find a shotgun in the back of a closet or in the attic rafters.
-
Although I never thought of it as secret or hidden, several years ago, I put some cash, maybe $400, with some other emergency things like flashlights. It was labeled, in an envelope. I forgot about it. Then a few months ago, I had trouble paying all my bills, and I remembered this cash. With a few other adjustments, this was just the right amount to make up the difference. I loved that!
|
| |
| << Home |
| |
|
|
|
|
I love secret these types drawers and hidden panels when I see them in old furniture on Antiques Roadshow and such. Since most of my furniture comes from Ikea, I don't have those types of hiding places. What I do have is a large library of books where I can hide things-- money, documents, letters-- in appropriate books on my shelves. As an example, I usually keep a bit of emergency cash in a copy of Crime and Punishment. There's probably a bunch of stuff I've forgotten about too. Have to be careful when lending out books!