>>Next on "Legacy List" with Matt Paxton, the team travels to historic Manheim, Pennsylvania, where they help a couple sort through two storage units, filled with family history.

>>All right, this has been in storage for how long?

I mean, the box says-- >>Says smart phone.

>>Their goal?

Find a home for some of their most cherished items and keep the family legacy alive.

>>I have never seen this.

>>That's a legacy.

>>That is.

>>I'm Matt Paxton.

Let's do it, man.

My team of specialists, Jaime, Mike and Avi, help me help people downsize their homes and settle estates.

As the largest population of baby boomers in American history transition towards retirement, they and their families face the overwhelming task of emptying their homes to move.

We help them sift through a lifetime of possessions.

>>Bingo.

>>Heirlooms, and collectibles.

>>Oh my gosh.

>>She's gonna love that.

>>To help them find the missing family treasures that mean the most to them.

>>Oh my goodness, >>Jackie.

And along the way, they'll discover that the most important museum in the world may be in their family's basement.

>>Oh.

>>I've never seen that, that is cool looking.

>>From attics to cellars, closets to cupboards, we uncover the memories they want to preserve.

This is living history, this is what we're here to find.

Let's go.

And discover the compelling, personal, and often historical stories spanning generations that are their family's legacy.

>>[Female Announcer] Support for Legacy List comes from MakeSpace.

MakeSpace picks up, stores and return your items on demand.

Available for home or business.

MakeSpace provides professional movers, plus bins, blankets and a digital photo inventory.

You can find us at makespace.com.

And by ensure long-term care where we believe aging at home near friends and family is ever more possible for more people.

Learn more at insureltc.com.

AARP Virginia offering family caregiving support with prepare to care and down sizing and decluttering on line workshops designed to help organize and assess family needs Find the complete online workshop schedule At AARP.org/virtual VA The Ruth Camp Campbell Foundation >>Today I'm driving through Lancaster County on the way to Manheim, Pennsylvania.

We are in the middle of just beautiful Amish country.

Farms everywhere, horse and buggies.

It's a really cool place to be.

I'm going to help Chris and Jean Gerding, and Chris and Jean live right downtown on Main street.

So I should be able to find 'em.

(upbeat music) [Matt] Hello.

>>Hey, hi Matt.

[Jean] Welcome to Manheim.

>>How are you?

Thank you, thank you.

>>Hi Matt.

>>It's good to see you man.

>>It's good to see you too.

>>You guys are right on Main street.

>>We are, it's wonderful.

>>You like it?

>>It's a great town.

It's small enough to just really put your arms around and enjoy everything here.

>>That's super cool.

Let's go inside.

>>Come on inside.

>>So we can talk, this is awesome.

[Matt] What a house.

Look at these beams.

What's the story here?

>>These beams were made before they had saw mills locally.

So, you see the axe marks, these are hewing axes.

These are hewn, not sawed beams.

>>So this is all the original wood in the house?

>>Original 1790 construction.

>>Wow.

All right, and so it looks like a bunch of stuff just got plopped down, what's happened?

>>We had a lot of Chris's fathers and some of his mother's items in storage for 12 years.

While we moved West, we recently moved back and Chris unloaded two very large storage lockers.

And these are some of the treasures that were in the storage lockers.

>>So a lot of us, that we easily downsize before we move, this time we're downsizing after we move.

>>That's exactly right.

>>Okay, these pictures are just glaring at me.

Who are they?

>>Those are my great-grandparents.

That's Carl Ernest Gerding when he was a relatively young man.

That's Anna Hesseltine Judson Green Gerding.

>>Wow, so we're gonna find a lot of family history.

>>A lot of family history.

>>Okay.

>>And it's pretty overwhelming, so we need your help.

>>I mean, the good news is this is not a massive amount of stuff, we'll actually be able to spend the time and go through it all.

>>And there are other rooms too.

>>Oh, there's more.

>>I understand, and I wanna hear the stories.

>>Sure.

>>'Cause I know you are full of these stories.

>>Oh, he's full.

>>It's true.

>>I'm sure you've heard 'em 20 times.

But me and my team, we wanna hear 'em.

>>Matt, there's something I wanna show you.

This is kind of a special thing.

This is a cane, gold headed cane.

>>A fancy cane, man, look at this.

>>It was given to one of my ancestors named Wilhelm Gerding.

This is in Germany.

He was a Lutheran minister.

>>And I bet that is pretty solid gold.

>>Alright, I see some pictures over here that I wanna ask quick questions.

>>Oh yes, absolutely.

>>And I know, Jean, that's kind of your deal here.

>>Yeah, that's sort of what captured me with Chris's whole history.

>>I know a lot about the professional photo organizers and Jean is one of their top members.

It really is one of the hardest things that our clients go through is sorting through thousands and thousands of photos.

I think we should hold that for later today.

I'm very, very interested.

>>There's a lot there.

>>I can see a lot already.

So where else do we need to go today?

>>I'm gonna tell you.

We have a concentration of clutter and history in two places.

One is the garage way out in the back of the property.

The second one is the third floor, which is my study and an attic.

>>Alright, let's get over there and do it.

[Matt] Alright, tell me about this awesome garden.

>>We love the backyard.

I mean, it was one of the features that really drew us to this house.

>>Oh, it's incredible.

>>The gentlemen who lived here collected specimens from all over the world and I wish I knew more about the trees.

I would love to know what they're all called.

Chris knows a couple of them.

>>Bald Cypress, I think we have eight Holly trees.

He's got other stuff here, a Redwood.

>>I love it.

>>So this is the famous garage, or infamous I should say.

It's kind of a mess.

I told you.

>>I'm not worried about that.

I wanna talk about that.

What year is that?

>>1988.

>>Oh, it's beautiful.

The movers clearly just dropped everything in here and rolled.

[Chris] This is kind of a nightmare as far as organization, what's here, this came from the storage lockers.

>>And we don't know what we're gonna keep and what's worth donating and what we could, close your ears, actually toss.

>>Can we throw anything away?

>>It's possible.

>>Yes, yes.

>>Let's start with this.

>>No, not that.

>>Who wants this?

>>Alright, here's the irony, this is an 88.

>>Yeah.

>>You know what the number one selling car was?

>>No.

(laughs) >>It was my nephew's car.

>>Believe it or not, the cozy coupe was the best selling car in the nineties.

That's so funny to see those two cars, I love it.

>>Yeah.

>>The popularity of children's toys can be measured in many ways.

The joy it brings to a young one's face, the amount of time it keeps a child's interest, and of course, how much money it makes.

As long as there have been kids, there've been things for them to play with.

The oldest known doll dates back almost 4,000 years.

As society advanced, so did its play things.

John Spilsbury, a British mapmaker and an assistant to the Royal cartographer invented the first jigsaw puzzle in the 1760s to help children learn geography.

Toys also had a practical use.

Rocking horses became popular as a way for children to learn how to balance themselves when riding a real horse.

During the early part of the 20th century, children kept busy playing with an assortment of mechanical toys and board games.

It wasn't until after world war II that the mass marketing of toys became big business.

Some of the best selling toys were accidents.

In 1943, a Naval engineer was developing a spring that could work in rough seas when it was accidentally knocked to the ground and tumbled end over end across the floor.

The slinky was born.

Over 300 million have been sold worldwide, generating over a billion dollars.

Rainbow modeling compound was originally designed to remove coal residue from wallpaper.

When sales declined, the company marketed it to art teachers.

They changed the name to Play-Doh and have sold over 3 billion cans.

But when it comes to four wheel fun, Little Tikes cozy coupe was no accident.

Arriving on the scene in 1979, it was one of the first molded toy cars.

The iconic red and yellow foot powered toy was called the world's best selling car for much of the 90s and can still be found parked in garages everywhere.

>>Alright, let's go and sit down and actually go through the legacy list.

>>Excellent.

>>Okay?

[Matt] This is my favorite part of the show.

I get to find out what your legacy list is, all right?

And I'm really excited to be with you because you and I are very similar.

We're both really good looking and we really, really like our family history.

>>Yes, this stuff's gonna go in a dumpster in our current family structure.

I don't want that.

I'm taking, hopefully decades before that point, to find a home who would value this stuff.

And it's not just part of my story, it's part of their story too.

>>So let's get into this legacy list.

What is your number one item?

>>There's a communion chalice that one of my great, great grandfathers was given in Germany for a 45 year service to the Lutheran church.

Now, this thing was finely built out of silver and it's quite a historical piece.

>>What about the second item?

>>Well, I gotta give the nod to my paternal grandmother, Ella Barbara Shourek Gerding.

Her parents came over from Bohemia, now called the Czech Republic.

She put herself through nursing school in Pittsburgh.

She became a registered nurse early in the career history of registered nurses.

>>And what year was, like 1915 or something?

>>1915, class of 1915.

>>Yeah.

>>She has pictures, she has nursing certificates, she has jewelry, she has commemoration of her time in the nursing school.

I wanna get that in a coherent group and I wanna donate that to them.

My next item is a small collection of rather emotional ties to items I have from my late sister.

>>Okay.

>>My sister, Leslie, left us at age 30 in 1987.

She was a remarkable scholar.

She was a STEM engineering and math and science type person long before you had a lot of women in the profession.

Somewhere in one of the boxes collections, you'll find, I think a terminal, there's a early version of the AT&T PBX terminal that she had been on the development team for.

>>I'm sure you know about where the terminal is?

>>Not exactly.

>>Somewhere in the house.

>>Yeah.

>>Okay.

>>You saw the garage Matt, I don't know.

>>Yeah, alright, so let's go to the next one.

>>Well, there is one thing I have not been able to locate.

It's an old 18--, early to mid 1800s, 1850 school books, standard US school text.

>>Wow.

>>This is something to do with English and grammar.

And my father always told me, this is a very rare thing, don't lose this, this is something that would be worth money or it'd be worth historical value.

I'd like to find that.

>>Okay.

Alright, we got one other item, we're talking about the people in your family, and the pictures of that past, the big band pictures that I saw.

Tell me about those.

Whose were they, how'd you get them?

>>Well, these were big name bands and some people that kind of drifted into obscurity, both are represented in this collection.

My grandfather was the manager of the local swimming pool and that swimming pool was associated with the thing they called the Willows Dance hall.

This is a nationally famous destination for big bands in the 30s and 40s, from RD Shaw, Benny Goodman, all that entire genre of music.

>>So it's a collection of photographs and autographs?

>>Yeah, some of them have personal autographs from some big names.

>>And there's some, we don't know, right?

>>And there's some we don't have much background at all.

We want to see how the whole thing fits together in the context of the historical period.

>>And some of these names, we've never heard of, and we don't know who they are.

And so, we'd love to know more.

>>Well, I think we have a lot to do.

>>I think you do.

>>Which is good, 'cause it's not just finding it, I want to find the story too.

>>And that's half of it.

>>Yeah, absolutely.

Well, you can't let go of the item unless you hear the story.

>>Oh yeah.

>>You learn a lot about a person when you hear their legacy lists.

He just wanted to celebrate his family.

So it really said a lot about Chris and about Jean because you know they're family people, and they just really care about those memories.

>>This is a quaint little Main street area.

>>I like it, seems cool.

>>Yeah, and look.

>>Oh, turntable Mike, here we go.

>>I'll catch up with you.

It was really cool walking up to the Gerding house.

There was some really cool businesses, a record shop and a barber shop right next door.

And just kind of sandwiched in there and for what it lacked in width, it went back a good ways.

>>This is close quarters living this close to your neighbors?

>>Yeah.

Oh man.

>>Oh wow.

It's like a little Oasis.

>>I mean, we have just walked into another world.

>>Yeah.

[Jaime] Yup, there he is.

We found you.

>>Beautiful.

>>Yeah, it's awesome, isn't it?

>>It is, it's beautiful.

>>Beautiful area, obviously his home is incredible.

It's really cool, super peaceful.

Don't let it fool you, there's a lot of work to do inside.

They've been paying storage for almost 15 years and they just dumped all that stuff back into a few rooms here.

The music stuff, you're gonna go crazy on.

>>Awesome.

>>There's actually some faith based stuff.

There is a silver chalice.

>>Holy Grail?

>>Communion chalice.

It might be the Holy Grail, it's very possible.

So I will drink from it first if it is.

>>Let's do it, I'm ready.

>>Okay, alright, you guys can pick attic or garage, which you wanna start in?

>>Garage.

>>Yeah, we'll head to the garage.

>>Alright, go for it.

>>It's just further away from you.

>>Yeah.

Avi and I we're gonna go into the piano room, and I sent Jaime and Mike into the garage and we've only got three days to go through the stuff, so we've gotta give it everything we've got.

[Matt] I wanted to show you this key first, man.

Look at this old skeleton key.

>>Oh man.

>>Hard to lose, man.

>>That is nice.

>>I mean keys have come a long way.

>>The house key, it's one of the most commonly manufactured metal items in the world.

It helps keep our valuables safe and the dangers of the outside world, well, outside.

The first keys were bulky, wooden devices that date back over 4,000 years.

The Romans improved upon this simple design by making their keys out of bronze and iron.

These keys were stronger and light enough to carry around in the pocket of your tunic.

Keys were also a fashion statement.

Wealthy Romans would often wear their keys like rings, a sign they were rich enough to own things that needed protection.

Another contribution the Romans made was replacing the pin and bolt with a simple shaft like design that had a tooth on the end of it.

It was called the skeleton key and could open multiple locks.

The common house key went relatively unchanged until the middle ages when English craftsmen improved upon the all metal warded lock.

Now a key needed to have the right pattern of notches to be able to turn freely and disengage the bolt.

Some historians believe there was another reason why locks and keys were becoming more sophisticated.

It was to keep women confined to the home when the man of the house was gone, thus the saying under lock and key.

For hundreds of years, homeowners carried around these clunky keys until the mid 18 hundreds, when American mechanical engineer, Linus Yale Senior, introduced the modern flat key.

Over the next century, the Yale lock manufacturing company would supply the world with millions of personalized locks and keys.

In today's push button world, the house key is slowly becoming obsolete.

But for thousands of years, these pieces of metal helped unlock history.

>>They're very collectible now, the older ones and the big ones, the more innate ones, but I just, I love them every time I see 'em.

>>Man, I feel sorry for the latchkey kids of the 1700s >>Had to carry them around.

Alright, let's get in here.

This house, we have a lot of work to do in here.

I think we're gonna find some good stuff in this one with Chris being a historian and his wife being a professional photography organizer, I just know we're gonna find some good stuff.

[Matt] These are old stamps.

This is a box of some faith stuff, 'cause I've got Presbyterian church plate.

>>Yeah.

[Avi] So you might be getting close to their chalice.

>>Yeah, maybe.

>>This takes me back here.

>>What do you got over there?

>>The old floppy disk.

>>Oh man, the whole three-inch.

>>Yeah, man.

The Bobbsey Twins.

>>My grandma used to always say that about me, you are a Bobbsey twin.

>>I mean the whole series, man.

>>Oh, wait a minute.

This might be the sisters.

>>You see a pin over there?

>>Well, there's a bunch of pins.

Here's her old name tags.

Look at this Avi.

The sister and the dad were both painters.

I don't know who.

>>Man.

I mean, this family had a great hand, man.

>>This is something he's really, really proud of, I think.

Yep, here it is, The Pittsburgh training school for nurses.

His grandma was one of the very early licensed nurse.

Look for the date on this.

>>There we go.

>>May 26, 1911.

I mean that's 110 years ago.

That is really, really cool.

[Matt] I was learning a lot about Chris's family as I went through that room, I found the nursing certificate.

I also found some beautiful art that his grandmother had drawn.

She was something else, man.

>>She had a hand >>She was a registered early on and an artist, >>Amazing artist.

>>Super cool.

Every layer that I found in this room of this family, I kept finding this really interesting flip-flop between education and creativity.

>>Jaime, I have a little something for you.

>>Oh yeah?

>>We work hard, it's time to have a little fun here.

>>Game break.

>>Game break, exactly.

>>Alright, what do we have?

>>Two of the biggest board games ever.

>>Do you think that either of these have all of their pieces?

>>Absolutely not.

>>Board games are part of my fun childhood memories.

I was an avid Candy Land player, The Game of Life was my jam.

>>Trouble?

>>Yes.

>>With the pop o'matic bubble?

>>Clue, loved Clue, all of that.

But it's like kids these days, at least kids that I've been around, don't have this appreciation, I'll say, for board games.

>>Yeah, well, I mean, everything is like this now.

>>I know.

>>Now we have versions of both of these games you can play on your phones.

>>I know.

>>By the way, Jaime, I have a bit of trivia for you.

What is the highest scoring word possible in Scrabble?

>>Supercalifragilisticexpialidoc >>I don't believe that is an official word and it might be-- >>Did I even say that right?

>>I think you did, that was good, I'll give you credit for that.

Points in real life, but not in Scrabble.

>>Okay.

>>Oxyphenbutazone, worth 1,458 points.

>>What does that even mean?

>>It's some chemical I guess, it's science.

>>Science.

>>Yeah.

(upbeat music) >>Going through a box you never know what you might find.

I think we might have something here.

The chalice we've been talking about.

>>Yeah, you think that's over there?

>>I think I got it my friend.

>>Alright, bring it over here, I wanna see it.

Whoa.

Look at that.

This was a really special item to find for this family.

I mean, this communion chalice had been passed down through generations of ministers in this family.

It's tarnished a little bit.

>>I mean this piece is at least 150 years old.

>>Oh, that's super cool.

I think you found it, man, I think that's legacy list item.

>>Cool.

>>L-G. >>Is it, yeah, it's an L. >>Yep.

But you can see it's has not been well-preserved and this is all moldy.

Something like this I would just encourage the family member to let it go.

It's time to just let some things go.

[Jaime] Come on.

>>Got somebodies socks and underwear.

>>Yeah, just found some old linens.

>>This one says Lee's smart CRT phone.

>>Oh yeah, it says Leslie's smartphone on this side.

>>Oh, Leslie, okay, got it.

>>Leslie.

>>Let's see what this is.

I can tell you it's heavy.

>>All right, well this is just a lampshade.

>>It's got socks on it.

>>Socks?

>>This is a-- >>You wanna put it up here?

>>Yeah, let's do that.

Alright, let's see what we got here.

I mean, I've never seen anything like this, have you?

>>No, and this says AT&T.

>>I mean, the box says this is her smart CRT.

>>It says smartphone, which there's a phone.

>>On a computer.

>>On a computer.

Is there a keyboard?

I mean, where would you type the, yeah, there is.

We found this really old computer monitor, but it was also attached to a keyboard and also had a phone attached to it.

I knew right away that this must be the computer that Chris's sister helped design.

>>Dial your phone number.

>>Yeah, type, and then.

>>Oh my goodness.

>>Oh, it's squishy.

>>I have not felt a screen like this ever before.

>>Digital touchscreen devices literally bring the world to your fingertips and using them feels intuitive.

It's all by design.

And it all comes down to touch.

The smartphone touchscreen you can't keep your hands off of is a collaborative brainstorm involving hundreds of patents and decades of visionary innovation.

The first digital computer to operate in real time was the Whirlwind.

Funded by the Navy and developed at MIT, Whirlwind ran flight simulations using a Buck Rogers's style light gun to send flight data to radar operators.

A few years later, Whirlwind laid the groundwork for Sage, the brains behind the cold war air defense system used to monitor possible Soviet attacks.

In the early 1970s, touchscreens tech goes big time with the PLATO 4 computer assisted education system.

Harnessing infrared light To sense a finger on a screen, PLATO is a hit with teachers and students, appearing on thousands of terminals worldwide.

The Holy grail of touch technology, the multi-touch screen, comes along in 1984, courtesy of Bell labs.

Their breakthrough recognizes a more intuitive touch.

The swipes, pinches and drags we now take as second nature.

10 years after that, IBM takes things mobile, releasing the first phone with a touchscreen, the Simon personal communicator.

Big and bulky, the Simon nevertheless takes bragging rights as the world's first smartphone.

Then in January, 2007, an earthquake rocks the world of high-tech, Apple unveils the outcome of its a secret project purple initiative, a little device they call the iPhone.

Here's a touch of reality that may make you drop your phone.

According to research, we swipe, type, tap and click an average of a phenomenal 2,617 times a day.

>>This is so special.

She died really young, I think around 30 or so.

>>I know.

>>And to be able to get through school and in a very short period of time, get to a position to make this.

It's amazing.

>>And also a woman in a field that's like predominantly male.

To me, the story of Chris's sister was very inspiring and being able to actually find something that she was so pivotal in engineering and designing as a young woman back in the 80s, was just really inspirational.

To Chris, this is really, really sentimental.

It's something tangible that his sister actually worked on before she passed away.

I'm really, really thankful that you found this.

Good find.

>>High five, alright.

>>High five.

>>I'll put this in your pocket.

Now let's get it back in the box.

(gentle music) >>Avi, I understand you are the military and militaria expert of this group.

>>That's what they tell me.

>>They tell you.

Well, you look like you know a lot about a lot of stuff.

Here I have something for you.

>>Yeah.

>>This is my grandfather's, the Frank Wesson 32 caliber single shot rifle.

>>This is awesome.

>>Kind of heavy.

>>So what'd your grandfather use this for?

>>Deer hunting, small game-- nothing big.

>>Yeah, so the 32 caliber is more common for the household.

He did make another version of this rifle that was a military version, actually a 44 caliber.

>>Oh, okay.

>>Yeah, and many of these rifles were sold to States, Midwest, like Indiana, Illinois, Ohio during the American civil war.

So that 44 caliber would have been used at some point during the American civil war.

>>On the union side.

>>On the union side, very interesting.

So Frank Wesson, they manufactured between 1859 and the 1880s.

So yeah, this falls right in the middle of that time.

And would this kind of rifle to load ammunition, you'd half cock the hammer here.

This trigger here would release the barrel.

And then obviously the ammunition, if it's loaded and it's been fired, you can eject the ammunition with their.

You might grab into your bag here, load, close, fully cock, aim, and fire.

>>My ancestors, my grandfather and his father and that generation, they had just founded a town in rural Tennessee, and they didn't have any 7-11's or shopping facilities to speak of.

So this is kind of like the way they eat dinner.

>>This was fast food, right?

>>This was fast food and slow cook, all in the same.

>>Absolutely, absolutely.

>>Very historic area.

>>Yeah, I love that everything's so close.

I mean, we're a couple blocks away.

>>Yeah, this is really cool.

As I spent more time in this town and learning about Chris's family, I decided I wanted to go visit the museum down the street to learn more about the German heritage of this entire area.

>>So here's some information.

>>Manheim, this is it.

Manheim Historical Society.

>>Yeah, here we are.

I'm excited to see it.

>>Alright, let's go check it out.

>>Let's step back in time.

>>Look at this, wow.

>>Oh wow.

>>This is the Fasig House and this house is typical of the houses that the early German immigrants lived in.

>>Chris' great, great grandfather actually founded a town in Tennessee that was all German settler.

So it was really, really cool to make the connection of what his ancestors lived like.

>>Germans have been coming to America since before the founding of the United States.

The name of the first permanent German settlement, Germantown, in present day, Pennsylvania founded in 1,683.

Those that come, like what they see.

And by 1775, Germans constitute one third of the population of Pennsylvania.

These new immigrants brave the journey to America with dreams of a better life.

They seek religious or political freedom, economic opportunity, or just the chance for a fresh start.

And Germany's loss is America's gain.

German Americans bring us the concept of kindergarten, the tradition of the Christmas tree, and let's not forget frankfurters, hamburgers and lager beer.

By the 19th century, Germans are one of the largest immigrant groups in the country.

In the mid 1840s, George Frederick Gerding, sets out to create a self-sufficient new Germany in the wilds of Morgan County, Tennessee.

Nevermind that he's never been to Tennessee himself.

Gerding buys 170,000 acres of land and calls his town Wartburg after the celebrated medieval German castle.

New arrivals with skills and education buy into Gerding's plan.

After years of struggle, Gerding and his countrymen lay the groundwork for a permanent settlement.

Mills for lumber, corn, wheat, and flour churn.

Fruit orchards, and grape vineyards thrive.

Even a small piano factory opens for business.

As fate would have it, their progress is short-lived.

The civil war that tears the United States in two, doesn't spare Wartburg.

Residents are divided on what side to support and many families flee the town never to return.

But this story has a happy ending.

After the war, wounds slowly heal.

Today, 175 years later, Wartburg is still with us, population 899.

It's roots, German.

It's heart, 100% American.

>>The Gerding's house is only about a block from here.

This is a beautiful piece of cast iron.

>>You could have done Apple butter, you could have done laundry, you could have done butchering when you had to boil things.

>>She did a lot of stuff.

>>A lot of stuff.

I think the rope bed is kind of cool.

Over time the ropes would sag, so they had a place where you could turn it to tighten the ropes and that's where the saying sleep tight came from.

>>That's really cool.

I wanna learn about this.

It looks like a beer barrel, but it's not, what is it?

>>This is called a paddle butter churn.

And in the day it was actually a technological advance.

You had to stand there practically all day to churn your butter with the early butter churns.

This one has paddles inside of it.

>>Oh wow.

Once we got going through the tour, we learned a lot about the early German settlers.

Not only what did the people in this locality do, but it was very similar to Chris's family when they came over to Tennessee.

>>This is actually a linen towel.

And ordinarily you had to spend a week getting the material ready to be able to weave for one day.

>>This is a hard working community and they save the things that matter to the mother family and it was really cool to see where Chris and Jean both got that from him.

I think we have some items in the house from the Gerding family that are from around this area, really in the last 300 years, would you guys be interested in receiving some of those items?

>>The Manheim Historical Society would be thrilled to take anything that has to do with the town of Manheim.

>>That's all Chris really wants.

He just wanted the community to see these items and share them.

They don't care about the financial value, they just want the next, people that will appreciate it, to see it.

>>We will appreciate it.

>>The second day was time to bring Jean and Chris in and really sit down with them and teach them the skills to continue to downsize.

They've got a lot of memories and they need to know how to manage those memories while they're letting go of items.

So because you guys are a couple, couples are like the worst two people to sort with.

We're gonna let him make decisions and we're gonna support those decisions.

Even if we think they're crazy and wrong, we're going to support them.

>>Yes sir.

>>Cool.

All right, translation, this is your chance to make decisions.

I really just wanted to leave that room with Chris knowing that, Hey, it is a step by step process.

You don't have to do it all in one day.

>>So what I like to do when I start a project is I like to designate boxes for the categories that we're sorting in.

And usually there's a keep box, a donate box, maybe a sell box, and then I like to have a trash bag on hand.

And at the end of the day in a room full of 20 boxes, you're left with maybe three.

>>What is in this box?

>>This, I don't know.

>>I think I know.

>>Sympathy cards for the loss of my sister.

Yeah, I wouldn't throw it in the trash, but I don't need to keep them long-term.

>>When would you go through that?

>>Oh, I think in the next six months.

>>You can't be hard on yourself when you're doing this.

You might get stuck on one piece of paper that has your grandmother's handwriting that you haven't laid eyes on in years, and it just is a trigger and it sends you back, honor that time and tell a story that it reminds you of if that's gonna be helpful.

But when those come up, just take a step back, take a deep breath and give yourself that time to process.

>>This I saw when I was going through it, I didn't really know who this was.

This is a history of deaths and birth.

>>It's my dad's mother's side of the family.

It's all the death notices for all the people in many of those pictures.

That's pretty personal, yeah, I'm not gonna throw that away.

>>So where?

>>Oh my office.

>>Do you ever find money in these things?

>>We do.

So here's what we find all the time.

>>Uncashed checks.

>>We find uncashed checks, we find savings bonds, lots of savings bonds.

Your sister was the age that somebody would've gotten a savings bond with each check.

But yeah, sometimes we also money.

But I think we're making our point here, which is, as a spouse, we gotta give the time, okay?

This happens to be all your family stuff, all right?

Guess what, if we found another storage unit that's her family stuff, we needa take the same time.

The best thing in this house is Chris's wife, Jean.

I worked with a lot of families and rarely is the partner this supportive.

I mean, Chris has made it a quest to really tell his family story.

And Jean supports it 100%.

I think this is what it takes to do this, okay, and for us to have the piano room the way we want it, we need to keep working, okay?

>>One of the things on the legacy list was a school book from back in the 1800s.

And as a former teacher, I was really, really hoping that I could find it.

I knew that Chris had a lot of books in the upstairs attic, so I had a good feeling that I was gonna find the textbook up there.

I spent hours up in Chris's study.

>>Okay, Matt, we have got a little bit of an overwhelming situation here with our photos.

>>The pictures.

>>This is just a very small dent in what we have.

>>Sorting through thousands and thousands of photos.

It really is one of the hardest things that our clients go through.

I know a lot about the professional photo organizers and Jean is one of their top members and she helps people go through all their photos.

We've got it spread out, but I see people with entire rooms full.

>>But Matt, they're never gonna have the time if they're gonna actually try to sit and go through them all, you have to have a method to your madness.

And we first begin with cotton gloves.

A lot of this media is more than probably 200 years old and we don't wanna be the first people to come along and put smudges and fingerprints and oils on them.

So, what we do first is we have sort of an ABC method.

An A photograph, you pick it up and you know immediately that you wanna keep it, you want to scan it and hopefully you wanna share it.

B is neutral turf where later you can go and decide if it's a C or an A.

You're not sure about it, but you don't want to get rid of it because it might have somebody important in it that you just haven't identified yet and you might find later.

C photos, okay, how many pictures do we need of Yosemite or Niagara falls or the empire state building.

>>Alright, so let's use that method on one of your piles.

>>Sure, grab that photo there.

Now, granted it is blown up, so it's going to have a little more impact.

So this is Chris, my husband.

>>Oh my Gosh.

>>Yes.

>>Who's, that, pop?

>>And that is Pop Gerding.

>>That's the infamous pop.

>>Who looks as if he's very engaged and very wise.

>>This is emotion, emotion, emotion.

So this is obviously an A.

>>That's definitely an A.

If you have to question it, if you pick up a photo and you have to question whether it's an, a or B, it's a B.

You don't want to digitize everything.

There is a cost to it in terms of dollars and there's a cost to it in terms of space and time.

>>So I've heard a lot about pop, and so this is what I've been really excited about.

This is what I've heard about.

>>Yeah, yeah.

>>This is the collection.

This is all the pictures and you can actually see the holes where they were up on the wall.

>>Oh, he had a big bulletin board in his office.

>>Here it is, here is the actual.

>>Yeah, that's so neat.

>>So this is pop, this is his office.

>>This guy's right there.

>>Yeah, there you go.

This picture, hung right there.

All right, so all these amazing historical people were on his wall.

>>I think you just hit the mother load of the valuable and very, very fun celebrity photos.

>>Alright, this for me is the one that really throws me in a positive light.

>>Oh yeah.

>>Shirley temple.

Now it's a little older, so she's-- >>The one, the only.

>>But there's only one Shirley Temple.

>>Much before her political career.

>>I just love it.

>>Her diplomatic career.

>>I love it, I love it, I love it.

Pop was really in it.

I mean, he was in it every day.

He had the who's who was coming around.

>>And yeah, I'm hoping some organization or museum or collection would just love this.

I just, I don't know.

>>And this is what's so cool about this.

If these were just random that you could buy anywhere, it's not as interesting as, I mean, Pop is part of the history.

And if you go back to the original picture, I mean, this proves that these pictures were pops.

I really wanted to learn more about the people in the big band photos.

I'm gonna send Mike and Avi to a local museum to learn more about the people in the picture and the big band era.

>>Hey, Steve.

>>How's it going.

>>Just great, been looking forward to this.

Let's go over here and talk.

>>We were so lucky to find Steve Rudolph, who's a local expert in the big band era.

>>Steve is gonna help us connect the dots on a lot of these items.

Going through the stack, they're all made out to pop.

So is it safe to say that these are all authentic autographs?

>>Oh, these are definitely authentic.

This kind of thing happened a lot with theater managers and owners of clubs and all that kind of thing.

This music was the most popular music of the day.

So they were able to hire the best photographers and the best tailors, they decked it out.

This was the biggest means of marketing yourself.

And they would have reams of these printed.

Their managers at the gigs would get addresses of people if they ran out and actually mail hand autograph pictures to them.

Well Pop must've been a relatively important character at this venue because they were doing something to please him to be asked back.

>>We're going through the photographs and Steve knows every single one of these artists.

>>That's Red Nichols.

Here's a guy that evolved out of the era of early jazz into the swing era.

Oh, Vincent Lopez.

There were many great band leaders who started in his band.

The Dorseys, Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey, Buddy Rich played for him for a while, Glen Miller played for him for a while.

This is Phil Harris.

He was an actor, a comedian and a decent drummer actually.

That looks like RD Shaw.

One of the greatest clarinet players.

Early in the swing era, there were four or five bands.

The Dorsey brothers, Benny Goodman, RD Shaw and Glenn Miller, of course, were probably the most popular bands.

>>I learned so much talking to Steve about the big band era.

>>There was a big band sound.

That sound included the colors of brass instruments, usually trumpets and trombones, and woodwind instruments, saxophones, flutes, clarinets, of course, without a drummer, you're not gonna have any kind of time field that's gonna be danceable.

Generally back in the day, the beat was in the bass drum.

So they would literally be doing this, and the high hat, it's two symbols that clicked together.

(hums a tune) And that's why people hit people, snap their fingers on two and four, not on one and three, yeah.

>>So you could tell the squares.

>>You could absolutely tell 'em a mile away.

(laughs) (upbeat music) >>Alright, y'all ready for this?

>>It's our last day at the Gerding house and we've gone through a lot of boxes with Chris and Jean, and I'm gonna bring all my guys in to really clean it out.

>>So over here we'll put the keep items and over there we'll put the items that are not being kept.

Okay?

Avi, you need a spotter with that?

>>I was gonna grab it.

>>Alright, you guys ready to see the work we did?

>>We are ready.

>>Oh my gosh.

>>Alright, here we go.

>>Whoa.

>>There we are.

It's empty.

>>It's a garage again.

>>And we finally cleaned out the piano room and you finally have a lot of room in your garage.

>>I don't even wanna know what you did with the stuff and I never want to see it again, this is great.

>>You guys want to maybe go in and start working on the legacy list?

>>That would be great.

>>Alright.

>>I'd love to.

>>Let's do it.

>>But this is the good part.

>>Yeah.

>>Your family has been so interesting that I'm actually really excited to go through this.

I learned a lot more than I expected.

>>Wow.

>>And the reason is your family documented so well.

>>They did.

>>You guys preserved it and you really took on the ownership of keeping it.

>>Yeah.

>>And so my job is pretty easy when there's someone in the family like you, that actually appreciates it and takes care of it.

Let's just jump right into it.

You asked us to find, >>Wow.

Oh my gosh, that's beautiful.

>>Silver chalice.

>>That's it.

>>This is it?

>>Do we know the date of this?

>>I think it's around 1875, don't hold me to the day.

But I mean, it's about 150 years.

>>That's old.

Oh my gosh, it's gorgeous.

Very, very pretty.

>>Well, that's silver Smith doing some work.

>>It's a spectacular family piece.

And the fact that you have that, I mean, this made it through multiple wars.

>>True.

>>So, I mean, this was hidden, this was taken care of for, it was really, really preserved on purpose.

And that is spectacular.

So, some of the Wwrs that it's gone through, I mean, I actually found this in your house.

This is a button from the Spanish American war.

>>No kidding.

>>I found this in your family's old jewelry box.

>>Oh my.

>>I don't know who would have fought in that.

>>Cuba, USA.

>>Wow.

>>Philippines.

It says Cuba, Philippines, USA, and Puerto Rico.

>>It almost looks like a button to a uniform.

>>I think it's a button to a uniform.

>>Wow, that's amazing.

>>That's Teddy Roosevelt era.

>>Alright, so the next item was a little more personal, is about your grandma, Ella shirk.

And you asked us to find some items for her.

>>Yes.

>>So your grandma, she went to, what was the Pittsburgh training school for nurses.

And this was her diploma, which is really cool.

And it became a couple of different things, it eventually became Shady Side Nursing School and then became University of Pittsburgh.

>>Man, I've never seen this.

>>Medical College.

>>With all the history about telling her about it, I never saw it.

>>Well, what I love about it is look at the bottom right corner.

>>All the signatures.

>>That's all the staff and faculty.

>>Really?

>>And they all hand signed it.

[Matt] Every doctor.

[Jean] Oh my gosh.

>>Look at the date on this.

Dates down here, middle.

>>1914.

>>1914, this is not a time when all women were granted an education like this.

>>Yeah.

>>Precisely.

Look at the ribbon is even in tact.

>>Beautiful piece.

>>That's beautiful, how you guys locate this stuff in this trash.

>>Super educating.

>>Alright, now then, you asked for another piece.

This is a really cool piece we found, it's from later in her life, but it's a medallion from the Shady Side.

>>Oh, that's wonderful.

>>Nurses school.

>>Look at that.

>>The school started 1884, that's the 70th anniversary medallion.

You had hinted there might be a pin or something and that was the best we found, which was that medallion.

>>I love that.

>>Oh, that's wonderful.

I have never seen this.

I've never seen this.

>>That was buried under a bunch of junk jewelry.

>>Wow.

[Matt] Now, same time your grandma was in medical school, she was an artist.

Look at this.

Signed.

>>Oh, that is just sweet.

That's incredible, I did not know that.

>>And here's another one from the same year.

And you've got a stack of these man.

You've got a bunch of your grandma's drawings.

>>I'm verklempt.

>>Tell me how you're feeling, what are you thinking?

>>Well, it's overwhelming.

>>And she was a very good illustrator.

I mean, this is not tracing paper.

I mean, she really worked hard.

>>So you know what is amazing to me as we're sitting here?

We've spent so much time talking about George Frederick Gerding and it's all about the men.

Well, you have just uncovered a huge piece of the female history in the family.

>>Let me assure you when you're researching the Gerding's, it is not just about the men.

>>That's I mean, we just haven't really given it its due and this is, I'm so glad you're bringing it to the floor >>I have to tell you the theme we've seen across all the families we've worked with.

There's some really strong women that weren't spoken about.

Alright the next item is in front of us.

We didn't find it.

It was an education book that you wanted to find.

>>Ah, yes.

>>We looked everywhere.

And when I say we, I mean, Jaime.

She is a former teacher, she was really focused on finding it and we kind of just exhausted our time.

There's still some boxes to go through.

>>Yeah, there are.

>>But I really believe you'll find it.

Next one was an item from your sister.

>>Ah.

>>She worked at Bell Labs with a very early predecessor to what is now basically-- the cell phone.

>>They call it a PBX, it's a home or business PBX.

It's a combination phone.

It's got a keypad here for dialing.

It's got a computer terminal under here, slide out.

And the key features, this elastomerics touch screen, which for the early to mid 80s, that was pretty advanced, they didn't have the screen technology.

>>I mean, this was very advanced stuff.

For her to get a job on this team, regardless of male or female.

>>Oh sure.

>>Super smart.

Just technology defining work that really paved the way for the rest of us.

>>Yeah.

>>It was really important to me to find that legacy list item of Chris's sister, because he loved her so much and she died really young in her life and she is still a constant force of motivation in his life.

Alright, which leads us to the last person we're gonna explore in your family.

You've got one character in your family I really wanna talk about, who is that gonna be?

>>I even know that answer >>On a scale of characters, there is one character and that's Pop Gerding, My grandfather, Charles Gerding senior.

>>Your dad's dad.

>>My father's father.

>>You're fathers dad.

Alright, now, an expert told me that I had to wear these gloves.

>>An expert, okay.

>>I wanna hold this picture of Pop.

If you look here, all the pictures behind your grandpa are people that were very, very famous and he kept these pictures.

>>Yes.

>>Okay?

I knew these pictures were important, so I sent Mike and Avi to meet with a big band expert.

We didn't realize how important these pictures were.

It's basically a who's who of the 1930s Jazz.

>>Yes.

>>Wow.

>>And let's go through some of these people.

There's a huge collection, I've just picked out a few.

I'm gonna let you tell us who that is.

>>This is just about my favorite, this is RD Shaw.

When he came into town, he made a point of stopping by and saying hi to my grandfather.

>>Do you know who that is?

>>Oh yeah, that's Woody Herman.

Woody Herman was big of that era and got bigger in the 50s.

He's writing thanks for?

>>Making our visits a pleasure.

>>So the goal is to put it somewhere where people can appreciate it.

>>And enjoy it, and so that it will carry on.

>>So here's the good news.

I know the goal was to get it to some cool places.

Alright?

With all the pictures we actually spoke to the Oakmont historical society.

>>Oh okay.

>>They want it bad.

They really, really want it.

They want pretty much anything that you're willing to give them for Pop, they're interested, okay?

>>That's so great.

>>This history is really amazing, and it's well-preserved and here's the kicker.

There's somebody that wants to tell that story.

>>Oh yeah.

>>Alright, and because your grandpa is attached to it that's why they want it.

So 60, almost 70 years the guy's been dead, and I didn't have to explain who he was.

The answer was yes.

That's a legacy.

>>That is.

>>Yeah.

>>That's how I wanna live.

>>That's wonderful.

>>Well, and it doesn't stop there.

We got one other one, alright?

We contacted the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, it's what eventually the nursing school that your grandma went to.

And they are very interested in that medallion and her degree, specifically because of all the staff that was there.

>>The signatures.

>>The signatures, yes.

People want these things.

You do it at your pace, but they're ready to go for the rest of the world to see.

>>Everybody wants a little bit of immortality.

>>Well you gave that to a lot of really cool people from your family.

Chris's story is pretty amazing.

All of their family were incredibly intelligent, very entrepreneurial and they were doers and he wants that story to be told, and I can see why.

Your house, it celebrates the past, but it also leaves space for your own future.

You guys made a dedication to each other to allow space for that.

>>Sure.

>>But you didn't let it overtake your life and you have a lot of a big open future ahead of you.

So I really respect that and I hope people will see this, and I know that you can do both.

>>Yeah, yeah, thank you for noticing that, and helping us celebrate that.

>>I think is really cool.

Thanks having us, this was awesome.

>>Thanks for your great insight, Matt.

>>Thank you.

>>[Female Announcer] Support for Legacy List comes from MakeSpace.

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Available for home or business.

MakeSpace provides professional movers, plus bins, blankets and a digital photo inventory.

You can find us at makespace.com.

And by ensure long-term care where we believe aging at home near friends and family is ever more possible for more people.

Learn more at insureltc.com.

AARP Virginia offering family caregiving support with prepare to care and down sizing and decluttering on line workshops designed to help organize and assess family needs Find the complete online workshop schedule At AARP.org/virtual VA The Ruth Camp Campbell Foundation (upbeat music) >>Visit mylegacylist.com to learn more about the tips, tools and professionals to help make your own big life move easier.

Learn more about this episode or submit your story to be featured on the show at mylegacylist.com.

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