Recently, we asked the BuzzFeed Community what the coolest thing they'd ever inherited was. Here are some of the most fascinating, heartwarming, and meaningful responses:
1. An Apollo contribution token
2. A high school yearbook
3. A cookie jar
"A cookie jar. It may seem trivial, but my grandma always had freshly baked cookies in the jar whenever we went to visit. When she got older and could no longer bake, she would still make sure it was always stocked with fresh store-bought cookies for our visits. She passed away in March and now it means even more to me."
4. A sheriff's badge
5. A brain in a jar
"My grandpa was a human anatomy and physiology professor, and he gave me a brain in a jar."
6. A ball of yarn
7. A raincoat
"My grandpa gave me a raincoat belonging to another American back in World War II. The story goes that this guy tried to escape from the jail my grandpa was in charge of, and my grandpa went after him, grabbed him by the back of this raincoat, and dragged him back to jail. In true form, my grandpa kept the raincoat as a souvenir."
8. A stuntman jacket
9. A piano
"I inherited my great-grandmother's piano. She put herself through music school in the early 1900s, played for the local movie theatre, and taught piano lessons. She saved and saved to buy her own piano, and eventually passed it down to my grandfather, and then he passed it down to me."
10. An ivy cutting
11. Knitting needles
"My great-grandmother who lived to be 102 gave me her knitting needles. She taught me how to knit one summer and I still use them today."
12. A tightrope walker's traveling chest
13. A postcard
"My grandmother always used to tell a story of how she and her best girlfriends traveled around Europe in the early '50s. A few years ago, she found the postcard she sent home to her parents talking about how much she was enjoying Rome. She passed it along to me knowing how much I loved hearing her stories."
14. A four-leaf clover
15. A cedar chest
"My maternal great-grandfather hand-made a cedar chest from a tree on his family's farm in Tennessee. It's passed down to the oldest in each generation."
16. A novel transcript
17. A newspaper
"My ancestor saved a newspaper reporting Lincoln's assassination in 1865. The two most interesting things about it are there are no pictures, and it's dated about two weeks after the assassination in DC because word traveled much slower back then."
19. A ring
20. A trunk
"I was given my great-great-grandmother's trunk that carried all of her belongings when she immigrated to the US from Ireland. The inside lid is covered in pasted-on newspapers, the oldest dated 1910."
21. An attestation paper
22. A letter from Winston Churchill
"About 100 years ago, my great-great-grandfather wrote a book on his war theory. While he was technically right, we wouldn't know that until almost 50 years later. He sent a copy of the book to Winston Churchill, who wrote him a letter back that very politely called him a moron. It's framed and currently hangs in my grandmother's hallway. I've not inherited it yet, but I'm trying to convince her to give it to me because it's hilarious."
23. A painting
24. Earrings from a Holocaust survivor
25. A Bible
"I inherited a beautiful illustrated Bible from my ancestors who immigrated to the US from Ireland in the 1800s. It has our family tree written in the front cover."
26. A camera
27. A hand-drawn portrait
28. A locket
29. A charm bracelet
30. A baptism gown
31. Love letters
"When my grandpa passed, we found a bunch of old letters in his nightstand. The best ones were to my grandma, addressed to 'My Darling' and signed, 'It was always you.'"