» Grandma Pat's 1947 Pyrex primary bowl set.
» I rescued a 1965 black-iron frying pan from my parents' cellar.
» I just wore a 33-year-old t-shirt, does that count?
» I have a 41 year old Braun coffee grinder I use daily.
» I regularly use my great grandmother's cocktail glassware from the 50's.
» Maybe my violin, which is probably from the 1890s.
» I have hand towels my Nana gave me and I'm sure she had them for most of her adult life.
Being American, quite a few people said "my house is almost 100 years old", which fails because it's not an object.
Someone said "I’ve got a few ammonite fossils" but that doesn't count because the fossils aren't used.
Emily offered "my great grandfather's hand-drill" but that's not something that gets an outing regularly.
I've come up with half a dozen objects I use regularly that are old by my standards.
I've taken the view they should have been bought by me (or for me) when new.
On the left is my waste paper bin. I can date it to 1974 because that's the year I got a bedroom of my own for the first time. It needed a bin and I got this one, a thin tub I've thrown all kinds of rubbish into since. The garish pattern on the outside was to match the wallpaper in my new room, a screamingly 1970s design in purple and green. My brother got the brown and green version of the wallpaper instead. I presume that after we sold the house in 1991 the new owners ripped down the geometric wallpaper and put up something more acceptable, or even painted over it. The wallpaper thus lives on solely as a slim wraparound, into which I occasionally chuck Kitkat wrappers, cashpoint receipts and expired socks... but not every day so maybe this doesn't count as properly regular use.
On the right is my Mr Men drinks mat. I can't give a precise date but I'd say roughly 1976, five years after Roger Hargreaves came up with the idea and two years after the Mr Men appeared on the TV. Again I got one and my brother got one, and I always went for Mr Happy because he smiled a lot (and because he appeared on the majority of merchandise). These days Mr Men drinks coasters are wooden with a cork underside, but mine was plastic all the way through. It used to be flat but 50 years of use has made it bobbly in the middle with a raised bump roughly approximating with Mr Happy's face. That's fine when I put a mug on it but somewhat dodgy when I rest a glass, so I was always very careful with my Mr Daydream glass tumbler in case that toppled over and spilt lemon squash all over my laptop. Alas that beloved glass smashed last month otherwise I'd have included it here, but I still rest every cup of tea on Mr Happy so he may well be my oldest object in regularly use.
On the left is my Splayd. It's a combination knife, fork and spoon in stainless steel and was made in 1978 by Viners of Sheffield. The V&A have one in their collection at South Ken (though not on display) and describe the squared end as "terminating in four prongs with deep, curved sides tapering towards the tip, the outer edges serving as a cutting edge". We liked them so much in our family we got four, most of which are still in my Dad's kitchen drawer but I've taken mine with me everywhere since. Admittedly it's better for mash than boiled potatoes, or for pasta rather than pie, but generally any meal that's soft and scoopable slips down much more easily with a Splayd. It's also allowed me to enjoy thousands of meals one-handed, especially TV dinners, and why they never caught on with the wider populace is beyond me.
On the right are my salt cellar and pepper grinder. They were purchased in Watford on 20th August 1983, either in Clements or in Timothy Whites, when my parents took me shopping to get ready for university. "You'll need this," they said, and they were correct. I no longer have the teatowels or the plastic bucket but I do have the transparent cruet set because it was impressively good quality. Thanks Mum, thanks Dad! The salt cellar doesn't get much use because I'm not one for white sprinklage, indeed in the past four decades I've only ever refilled it twice. But the pepper grinder has done sterling service spicing up potentially tens of thousands of meals, indeed it did its job on last night's chicken pie perfectly, and hopefully will continue to do so for many years to come.
On the left is my digital clock radio. It's from Boots, from the days when they did electricals, and the display does still work perfectly but doesn't photograph well. My best guess is that I bought it in 1987 when I moved into digs for my first job, although the Radio Museum reckons the CR7 model came out in 1988. The black plastic cube is tuned by turning an analogue dial on the side and does both medium wave and FM, the latter courtesy of a dangly black aerial. This clock has woken me up on the vast majority of my working days, usually to the Radio 1 breakfast show rather than the electronic beep, and only occasionally did I ever feel the need to hit snooze. More importantly its red digits are those I see in bed every night, including every time I've woken up and thought "is it morning yet?" and I hate to think how often that's been.
On the right is my digital watch. I bought it from H Samuel in Bedford on 16th February 1993 after my last digital watch broke, choosing this because I wanted a simple watch with big digits rather than overfussy features. I didn't realise at the time that the Casio A-158W would become a beloved classic, worn unironically by retro trendsetters decades later, and I always smile when I see one on someone else's wrist because mine's original. I've used this watch to track the most important moments of my life, also to catch I hate to think how many trains and buses, also to watch so many minutes and midnights tick round precisely. It has one dodgy button and every time the battery needs changing I worry it won't survive the switchover, but somehow it's still going strong. It's not the oldest object in my repertoire but it does get the most regular use for something that's lasted way beyond its expected lifespan, indeed as of this month I've been wearing it for exactly one-third of a century.
All things considered I think the oldest object I regularly use is my 50 year-old Mr Men drinks coaster. What's yours?
