January 14, 2025
Introduction: In this article – the second of a three-part series – Jessica Edwards writes more about a dilemma she recently faced that most family historians confront: planning what to do with family heirlooms and memorabilia after you’re gone. Jessica has had a lifelong interest in her family’s history, and has documented and added more than 37,000 people to her family tree!
In Part 1 yesterday, I described some of what I went through in planning what to do with my family heirlooms after I’m gone. In today’s Part 2 I have some ideas that might help you regarding your own family heirlooms and memorabilia. For a number of reasons, these personal possessions are often not specifically accounted for in wills, trusts, and other estate planning documents.
Let’s start by defining some terms that you might see: Memorabilia, Treasures, Junk, Keepsakes, and Heirlooms.
- Memorabilia is defined as objects kept or collected because of their historical interest, especially those associated with memorable people or events. In my belongings I have a perfect example: I have a copy of President Kennedy’s inaugural address on velum that had been presented to my father (who had guarded JFK during his brief tenure as a U.S. Park Policeman). Memorabilia may be easily confused with collectibles, but they are two very different animals. Collectibles are just purchased for fun but memorabilia serve a purpose. Things like sporting event programs and souvenirs, such as Olympics programs and World Series pennants, are memorabilia.
- Treasures are wealth (such as money, jewels, or precious metals) stored up or hoarded or buried; wealth of any kind or in any form: riches. However, you can also treasure things with purely sentimental value – like your pet rock or your favorite toy. Treasures can be troublesome (leading to worries about accumulating and sustaining material wealth).
- Junk can be defined as old or discarded articles that are considered useless or of little value – but what one person considers junk another might consider to be valuable.
- Keepsakes are possessions that are given or kept specifically for sentimental or nostalgic reasons. For example, my mother had a music box that reminded her of her wedding reception. It was inexpensive and mass produced, but it meant a lot to her. This was a keepsake for her, but if that keepsake gets passed on multiple times, it may eventually become a family heirloom (such as holiday ornaments).
- Heirlooms are generally considered to be valuable objects that have belonged to a family for several generations.
If you look at these definitions, they all boil down to interpretation of whether the item is of value to a specific person. For example, the trunk my grandfather made is a very valuable heirloom to me because of all the family history it represents. Others see an old trunk with a non-functioning lock and a broken strap on one side.
I can see my grandfather making it lovingly for my maternal grandmother. I see him and his older children slowly tearing apart the chicken coop on the property to reuse it so that nothing is wasted. They even pulled out the nails and, after straightening, reused them. The trunk is made of wood and nails from that chicken coop.
I see the trunk’s leather straps as the product of hours of tanning my grandfather did day in and day out. He collected the leather scraps left over from his job at the Endicott Johnson Shoe Factory. Some may see the thin wrapping paper that has been pasted to the inside of the walls of the trunk and think how unfashionable it looks. I see that lining and appreciate my grandmother’s attempt to bring a small amount of beauty to her bleak life.
The trunk stirs up more memories of my grandfather and his family. I see him buying a piece of property in Endicott, New York, after earning every possible cent as a coal miner in Snow Shoe, Pennsylvania. I see him playing the accordion for a polka band and doing carpentry work in his “off hours.” I see that they went to local events late at night or the next early morning to see what things had been lost by others (wallets, blankets, etc.) that they could sell or use in their burgeoning family to make life a little easier.
I see my grandfather working on projects at home when not working at the shoe factory, or making some side money by building things for others. I see my mother and her siblings taking their hard-saved pennies and going to a carnival and tossing pennies to win the carnival glass that they gave to their mother (like many mothers, everything “extra” went to providing for her husband and children, so she had little of “value” herself).
Family heirlooms are in actuality family memorabilia, and often not worth as much as the stories that go along with them. These stories help keep family histories alive, develop a sense of understanding, and establish lasting family traditions.
When creating an estate plan, people are often most concerned with passing on the “big things” like real estate, bank accounts, and vehicles. Yet these possessions very often aren’t the items that have the most meaning for the loved ones we leave behind. Also, keep in mind that the passing of heirlooms sometimes involves traditions being passed along in the family – like the oldest child or first married being given the mother’s engagement ring.
Smaller items like family heirlooms and keepsakes, which may not have a high dollar value, frequently have the most sentimental value for our family members. So, unless you have banked and invested quite a bit of money, what can you leave family members after you’re gone?
Here is a list that I put together (with suggestions from others) of things generally left in wills to heirs. Which of the definitions given above would you apply to each item?
- Jewelry
- Photographs
- Books
- Art
- Musical instruments
- Furniture
- Clothing
- Bibles
- Recipes
- Family documents (such as birth certificates, baptism records, and citizenship papers)
- Collections (such as sports memorabilia, coins, stamps, and dolls)
In the legal world heirlooms and keepsakes are considered “non-titled personal property.” These items need to be left to specific individuals – but even with a will, the leaving of these items can create bitter conflicts among family members. Indeed, fights over heirlooms and keepsakes can cause close family members to never speak to one another again.
For example, my maternal grandmother’s ring was left to me – but a sister coveted it. She accused me of stealing it when she could not locate the ring when surveying my mother’s belongings before the will was read. (I later found it had fallen behind a torn section of the lining of my mother’s jewelry box, which would have gone to a yard sale had I not taken it. When I discovered the ring, I offered it to my sister for the cost of shipping it insured to her – still unreimbursed by the way.)
Family infighting over a deceased loved one’s belongings happens all too often. It’s a difficult subject, but there are strategies to help deal with this situation. This was originally going to be a two-part article, but I have enough ideas about these strategies that I’m going to present them in a third article. Look for it next week.
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Note on the header image: family heirlooms (not from the author’s collection). Photo credit: https://depositphotos.com/home.html