Old curiosities, a history hunter’s mission to salvage a bygone age

Category: (Self-Study) Human Interest

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Everything from rusty typewriters to vintage cameras can be found at anthropologist Aditya Vij’s home in New Delhi. In an age of new technology and innovative products, walking into his home is like stepping into a time machine.

Vij is an avid collector of artifacts, and over the decades, the self-proclaimed “history hunter” has gathered thousands of items that span centuries and documented their relevance and the impact they have had on society.

Each collectible he has salvaged feels like a victory against time, Vij says, underscoring his belief that maybe one individual’s attempts can quietly resist their erasure from people’s memory.

“I try to write that unrecorded history through my collections, through the products, and through whatever relevance and impacts it has had on the society. Every product, or any of its aspect that has existed, has played a role,” Vij says.

Over the years, he has collected a wide variety of items.

“Every time around that I lay my hands on a product, that is the first thing that comes to my mind—today I managed to save a piece of history which perhaps was never recorded,” says Vij.

“That is the thing that keeps me going because I try to keep or try to save a piece of history every time that I step out.”

Through the preservation of such items, Vij hopes to educate future generations.

“I get in a lot of requests from parents that they want to bring in their kid to showcase them that—come we will show you how we used to type a letter, or come we’ll show you how we used to click a picture, or how we used to dial a phone, and kids are shocked,” he says.

Vij aspires to create a physical space where youngsters can learn about innovations from the past.

“My hope is that I can actually create a proper, bigger-sized museum where I can actually cater to schools,” he says.

This article and video were provided by The Associated Press.

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[Artifacts collector Aditya Vij checking a typewriter out of his collection]

[Vij typing on a Remington Easy-Riter typewriter]

[Keys of a Corona typewriter]

[Vij organizing old fan regulators on the floor of his storage room]

[Vij showing functioning of US Army property K-20 aerial Graflex camera, light weight and hand-held camera used for military reconnaissance during the Second World War by the US Army Air Corps]

[Blackened-out serial number and other details of the camera]

[Vij placing an old CD on the radio player]

Aditya Vij (interview): “I try to write that unrecorded history through my collections, through the products, and through whatever relevance and impacts it has had on the society. Every product, or any aspect that has existed, has played a role.”

[A collection of pagers]

[Old landline telephones kept together]

[A coin-operated pay phone]

[Initial models of wireless mobile phones. On the left – California Mobile Phone by Motorola, on the right Como CT phone weighing approximately 500 gm]

[Rolle Flex, Kodak and Yashica stills cameras that used films, stacked together]

[Around 1000 old cameras stacked together]

[Vij stacking tin boxes in his collection, vintage wall clocks visible in the foreground]

Aditya Vij (interview): “Every time around that I lay my hands on a product, that is the first thing that comes to my mind – today I managed to save a piece of history which perhaps was never recorded. So that is the thing that keeps me going because I try to keep or try to save a piece of history every time that I step out.”

[A ‘weight measure’ used during 17th century Indian emperor Jahangir’s reign]

[Posters of Indian films of the past]

[Vij showing old matchbook collections, manufactured on the themes like ‘vintage cars’ and ‘butterflies of India’]

[A lock-and-key, dating back to the year 1947, the year witnessing the historic partition of the Indian subcontinent during gaining independence from the British colonial rule]

Aditya Vij (interview): “I get in a lot of requests from parents that they want to bring in their kid to showcase them that – come we will show you how we used to type a letter, or come we’ll show you how we used to click a picture, or how we used to dial a phone, and kids are shocked. They can’t even use a rotatory phone today to make a call. How can you make a call on this? (the kids ask).”

[Vij stacking old tin boxes]

Aditya Vij (interview): “My hope is that I can actually create a proper, bigger sized museum where I can actually cater to schools, which are there, and get everybody across and perhaps spend my whole day explaining and telling this.”

[Vintage collectible items – water bottles painted with posters of Indian films]

[Vintage tin boxes]

[Old wall clocks and old telephones]

This script was provided by The Associated Press.