
A $2 photo from a California junk shop is the ‘holy grail of Western Americana’ - brudgers
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
======
bloat
You must have pretty specialised knowledge to look at that photo in the junk
shop and say to yourself, "You know, that might be Billy the Kid. I should get
this appraised."

~~~
rokhayakebe
Now imagine, sometime, somewhere, someone got a written manuscript from Plato,
or the Buddha, or another figure and just used it to make fire.

~~~
dogma1138
That might be unfortunate, but we've set fire to priceless manuscripts
intentionally far more often.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destruction_of_the_Library_of_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destruction_of_the_Library_of_Alexandria)

~~~
shas3
Also, sacking of Taxila/takshashIla [1] and Nalanda [2] in Indian subcontinent
by Huns and Islamic marauders.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxila](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxila)
[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nalanda#Decline_and_end](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nalanda#Decline_and_end)

The other, brighter side of this coin is the many remarkable rediscovery
stories, like that of the Archimedes palimpsest [3] in the 1990s and Indian
statesman Chanakya's 3rd century BCE manuscript 'Arthashastra' [4] in the
1900s.

[3]
[http://www.archimedespalimpsest.org/](http://www.archimedespalimpsest.org/)
[4]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthashastra](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthashastra)

------
dalke
Short version: the photograph is only the second verified image of Billy the
Kid. Verification of it required an in-depth analysis, including finding where
the picture was taken.

~~~
pavel_lishin
I wish the article had gone into more detail about what the verification
process is like.

~~~
lisper
Yeah, this. I don't see how they could possibly verify that this is actually
an image of BtK when the face is so obscured and the provenance of the image
so uncertain. Kagin's is being very cagey about it too: "Any qualified
individual wishing to review the authentication dossier and discuss the
potential acquisition of the Billy the Kid Croquet Match Tintype are welcome
to contact..."

~~~
giarc
Likely coincided with knowledge about where he was living at that point in
history. This also takes place after a wedding, so that likely gave some clues
if they could determine who was getting married.

As well, the article mentioned that this is the first photo of him with some
of his known gang members. The man to his left is quite clear, and therefore
if they can identify him as an associate of Billy The Kid, perhaps that gave
them more reason to suspect it was Billy.

~~~
brudgers
The location of the wedding would probably have been recorded and the lay of
the land could be verified against the current landscape. Similarly, there
would be land deeds and if the road in the foreground was a public road, then
that could also help identify and confirm the location.

As for the associate, my sister thought it looked liked two boys in the midst
of arguing over rules and cheating in the way that older and younger brothers
do...

------
pgrote
Of all the photos being taken right now, it's odd to think there probably
won't be discoveries of old photos in junk shops in 2150.

~~~
dogma1138
That is actually a serious issue that many scientists including historians,
anthropologists and archaeologists are actually trying to find ways around.

Digital storage is far more fragile than many physical storage mediums,
digital data in many cases might also be indistinguishable from random data in
such cases where it have been heavily encoded, encrypted, or the mata-data was
lost.

Time capsules are now becoming more and more important (including us sending
one to Mars) because if we blow ourselves up or encounter a calamity that will
erase much of modern technology we will lose more data in that instant than
all the data lost to history before that.

Most modern storage media will not last a century even under good conditions,
yet alone under conditions that we've found many historical manuscripts and
objects of significance so it's quite important for us to develop a high-
density, long term media which can store current information in ways that will
be fairly simple to access, micro-film was a good candidate at one time but
the information density was too small, so allot of people are working on more
high density storage media including crystals, and even encoding allot of
information into DNA, if you can turn an entire forest into a time capsule you
might be able to preserve knowledge for a very very long time.

~~~
pavel_lishin
> _if you can turn an entire forest into a time capsule you might be able to
> preserve knowledge for a very very long time._

I do like the idea that the information would be self-propagating, but who'd
think to look in the DNA of some trees?

~~~
dogma1138
Future humans that knew about it, future humans that had to rediscover DNA,
evolved intelligent racoons, Eloi, Morlocks, aliens take your pick.

The idea is just to have some way to ensure that enough information survives
in persistent forms, you can store "important" (for scientific advancement)
stuff in various types of media which is progressively harder to access and
gets more and more dense, and eventually store everything and it's mother in
DNA or anything similar.

As things go if in 50 years we lose Google, Wikipedia, Facebook and
Amazon/Kindle we might be on our way back to the stoneage.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Obvious question: did it already happen? Did previous iteration of humans
leave us some messages? Maybe the pre-Deluge civilization[0]? That would sort
of explain why I sometimes look in a mirror and feel like the reflection was
telling me something about cloud model being bad. s/.

[0] - the story of Biblical Deluge tells that part of the reason God had to
sink the planet is that because angels descended from heaven and started
breeding with people and corrupting them. If one believes in that story and is
particularly imaginative, one had to ask just what level of technology did we
have back then, after being 'corrupted' by what would be aliens?

~~~
dogma1138
Not sure but Assassin Creed: Syndicate is around the corner so we'll probably
find out the next part of the story.

~~~
TeMPOraL
You're telling me this idea is actually explored in Assasin Creed? :o. I guess
I need to finally start playing it.

~~~
dogma1138
That's the entire backstory and the connecting over-arcing story for AC (and
also somewhat Watch Dogs because it's apparently the same universe), and for
the most part it's much more interesting than the game with allot of very cool
ideas and premises.

Basically modern humans and neanderthals were bred by a more advanced and
ancient form of humans (physically similar to AMH) we were all designed to
have a naturally occurring fractal antennas in our brains that allowed them to
mind control us to be used as slave/servants (humans) and soldiers
(neanderthals). Some humans had a mutation (either naturally occurring, or a
case of sleeping with the help which was also implied in the game, basically
seraphim doing earthling hot chicks > flood recap) that made them immune to
the mind control tech. There was a rebellion and a catastrophe (solar
eruption) the ancients mostly have died out, some organizations know about
them and some parts of the mind control tech have survived (pieces of eden in
the game). The templars are after that tech to control the entire world, the
assassins want to stop them.

PSA: That's pretty much spoiler free you can probably find a whole recap of
the premise online.

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _and also somewhat Watch Dogs because it 's apparently the same universe_

Wait what?! Ok, my mind is officially blown here. Thanks for telling me that,
I'll check it out.

------
NullCharacter
If you had bought this picture for $2 later to find out it's worth $5,000,000,
would you feel an obligation to share some of the proceeds with the shop from
which it was purchased?

~~~
dogma1138
If you buy a winning lottery ticket would you give part of your winnings to
the store you bought it from?

~~~
lmkg
I might give them a tip if I'm a regular customer, but it's not as obligatory
as tipping waiters. I think it is customary to tip the dealer when gambling,
though.

~~~
dogma1138
Tipping is very dependent on the local customs, tipping a waiter in Germany
for example (especially in the more rural areas, or traditional restaurants)
will be somewhere between unexpected to outright insulting.

Tipping dealers in UK casinos is actually forbidden by the 'Gaming Board'
(gambling commission) to discourage "cheating" since they believe that if
dealers might get a cut of the winnings they might be inclined to stack the
odds in the player's favor.

~~~
shawabawa3
> Tipping dealers in UK casinos is actually forbidden by the 'Gaming Board'
> (gambling commission) to discourage "cheating" since they believe that if
> dealers might get a cut of the winnings they might be inclined to stack the
> odds in the player's favor.

Are you sure about this? I've played poker in UK casinos where tipping was
very common

~~~
dogma1138
Yes there are games in which you cannot tip, in all others the tip doesn't go
directly to the dealer and there is an official process to distribute it, and
even that's is restricted.

"Licence condition 10.1.1 Tipping – personal licence holders All non-remote
casino operating licences 1 Licensees must only permit tipping of staff
holding personal licences where a tronc system is operated; that is to say,
where all tips are pooled and distributed amongst the employees concerned. A
separate tronc may be operated for each of a number of categories of licensed
staff."

[http://www.gamblingcommission.gov.uk/pdf/Latest-LCCP-and-
Ext...](http://www.gamblingcommission.gov.uk/pdf/Latest-LCCP-and-
Extracts/Licence-conditions-and-codes-of-practice.pdf)

[http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/nimmanual/nim02941.htm](http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/nimmanual/nim02941.htm)

Edit:

It's seems that all tipping was universally disallowed until 2005 (haven't
been in a UK casino for about 10 years)

"In the rest of the world, tipping the dealer for success is the norm. In
Britain it has become legal (on implementation of the 2005 Gaming Act) and now
it is acceptable. It is still however not as commonplace as in other places in
Europe or America."

Beyond that it's subject to the 2005 gaming act and the tornc and personal
license holders schemes.

------
mmmBacon
The caption says the image was taken during the summer of 1878 but there are
no leaves on the trees. So either the trees around their hide out were all
dead or it wasn't summer.

~~~
echion
It can be hot and dry in summer in New Mexico. Not great for leaves.

"The loss of numerous leaves from trees is not uncommon in New Mexico in
June." \--
[http://aces.nmsu.edu/ces/yard/1997/063097.html](http://aces.nmsu.edu/ces/yard/1997/063097.html)

~~~
mmmBacon
Yes it's also dry here in CA and trees will lose leaves but not _all_ of their
leaves. The trees in the photo are completely bare. Note also that the grass
in the foreground shows up in the image as dark. This implies that the grass
is green. So even if you are correct and all the trees have lost all of their
leaves then you would expect the grass to be dormant (not green) and show up
as light in the image if it were summer.

------
jacquesm
[http://www.aboutbillythekid.com/](http://www.aboutbillythekid.com/)

------
morgante
TIL that "senior numismatist" is a job title.

It's consistently amazing how incredibly specialized our modern economy is.

~~~
crystalmeph
Even though it's not technically a job title, I always start daydreaming
whenever a new leap second announcement comes out:
[https://hpiers.obspm.fr/eoppc/bul/bulc/bulletinc.49](https://hpiers.obspm.fr/eoppc/bul/bulc/bulletinc.49).
It's always addressed to "authorities responsible for the measurement and
distribution of time." If I had that kind of job responsibility, I'd always be
threatening to cut people's time rations.

------
peter303
William Koch (the "poor" brother) is a western nut and bought the other photo.
With his wealth he probably bid a high price. (His brothers expelled him from
the family business with smaller share of stock.)

------
kelvin0
I wonder which Instagram filter he used, looks really old...

------
mjmsmith
The ten-year-old in me was delighted to learn that there is actually something
called the Butte Nugget.

------
leaveyou
"It has been independently appraised at $5 million..". Ba ha ha ha, maybe it's
raining money in California but in my part of the world there is a saying:
"It's not a fool the one who asks, it's a fool the one who offers.. [an
exorbitant price for something]".

