Collector vs. hoarder, what’s the difference ?

[60FlatTop]

I am going to see if my wife will embroider this. I will get a nice frame!

 

The hall had been reduced in width to a foot wide by 

 magazines and papers stacked each side floor to ceiling 

[Dandy Dave]

2 hours ago, Larry Schramm said:

 

Yeah, but you went and bought back the road grader that you sold at the auction.  🙂

Yes I did. All 11 tons. The fellow that bought it was doing nothing with it. I bought it back and finished the repairs that I was not able to finish before the auction. Thinking about donating to the Historical Construction Equipment Association in Bowling Green, Ohio. It is an extremally rare machine as only 56 model 12 Caterpillars were built with a G-4600 gas engine It is serial 6M17. Yes, the 17th machine in the series. It needs to go to a good home where it will be preserved and not cut up by a scraper. So my mind set makes me what then? I guess not a hoarder. If I don't keep it and put it where it will be seen by many maybe not a collector either. Which brings a third thought. Maybe I am a Preserver. I like to share what I have and like to see others get some joy out of the items I display and operate from time to time at shows. These machines do not just sit and rust while in my care.

Edited July 17, 2021 by Dandy Dave (see edit history)

[Dandy Dave]

Thinking about it yesterday. I guess some of us are Preservationists. We collect to an extent. We preserve and maintain the items in our care sometimes making them better, but never worse, while we are the caretakers for them. We are willing to pass them on when the fun of ownership wears off and the item has found a new custodianship that will keep it for the next generation. Hoarders do not maintain, they just keep, and time, unfortunately, takes it's toll. Especially true for Automobiles in poor storage. So we have a new category to add to the title. Preservationist.  

[Robert G. Smits]

4 hours ago, Dandy Dave said:

So we have a new category to add to the title. Preservationist. 

I love it, can't wait to  explain it to the wife!!!

[TTR]

7 hours ago, Dandy Dave said:

So we have a new category to add to the title. Preservationist.  

Not really necessary or needed since any “preservationist” with more than one subject item can easily fall, or be pigeonholed, into either of the two title categories. 😉

Edited July 18, 2021 by TTR (see edit history)

[wayne sheldon]

On 7/17/2021 at 3:13 AM, Pilgrim65 said:

when we entered the hall had been reduced in width to a foot wide , by magazines and papers stacked each side floor to ceiling ,

 

My dad, at his shop and in his garage, was almost that bad.

 

On 7/17/2021 at 3:13 AM, Pilgrim65 said:

took away over 50 cu m of household rubbish .

 

I have seen much worse. I worked with my dad in the family contracting business for over thirty years. It was quite trying many times, but I am glad we had the relationship we did. That contracting business, was in communication systems, and we did it ALL! A lot of our 'bread and butter' work was private television systems in areas not well served by other means. So, we worked at literally hundreds of apartment and mobile home sites, from small to thousands of units. So I got to see a lot of how 'people' really live. And it ain't pretty!

I won't go into the nasty details (you probably wouldn't want to hear them and might not believe them anyway?).

One hard working young couple bought a mobile home for $9000 cash in a park where the worst mobiles usually went for twice that. They spent six months, cleaning, painting, and replacing the floors themselves. He was able to borrow a ten yard dump truck from a friend, filled it and hauled away three full loads. From inside a small double wide mobile home!

After about a year, they sold that mobile home for over $30,000, and with a little financing bought one of the biggest and nicest homes in the park!

 

In a large apartment complex, we had a pretty good working relationship with the maintenance office and crews. One day, I went in for some routine servicing of the equipment, and found the head of maintenance going through a supplies catalog. He made a comment about needing a couple hazmat suits for his guys to go in and clean up an apartment. I thought he was joking. He wasn't. I saw the apartment. There was an antique radio my dad might have liked, and an antique piano I could have had for hauling them away. But I wasn't willing to touch them. And I often had to work in rat infested equipment rooms.

[Terry Bond]

I thought that photo looked familiar.  It was sent to me by a friend out west who actually bought the early car shown.  It's a 1917 Paterson and here it is now fully restored, along with my copy of the photo he sent of it still in the barn, and later being pulled out.  That photo of it still in the barn is fascinating.  It sure seems to have made the rounds.

Terry

[60FlatTop]

16 hours ago, wayne sheldon said:

And I often had to work in rat infested equipment rooms.

Mold covered ductwork and machinery in equipment rooms deep in the bowels of institutions of higher learning. As across campus towheaded Freshmen were handed compact fluorescent light bulbs to become good stewards of the Earth.

 

"It's on our list of upcoming capital improvements"  😀

[John348]

I don't think the the title is self imposed of being a hoarder or collector, but rather given to the person when they pass away by the people who have to clear out the contents of their estate. 

[TAKerry]

Wayne S, I know exactly what you mean. I do a lot of home improvement, handy man type of jobs now. In and out of a lot of houses. My own house is pretty well maintained but every once in awhile my clean freak wife will complain about the mess (not really that messy). I try to tell her that I have seen some pretty messy places and ours doesnt even rank. 

 

There was one couple we built a new house for. They sold their farm to a developer and ended up with pretty deep pockets. They didnt like the developer so had us build their new house. The one they were living in was to be demolished to make room for the new entry road. That house was a 100 yo farm house. I was only in the living room once, there was literally a path from the front door to a chair, and a path to the kitchen. Everything else was stacked high with newspapers and the like. 

[Angelfish]

A collector moves his cars by starting and driving them.

A hoarder moves is cars by digging them out from under the old wall paper rolls and packing crates and hooking a chain to them. 
A stockpiler is just trying to keep them away from the hoarders. 

[8E45E]

9 hours ago, Angelfish said:

A collector moves his cars by starting and driving them.

A hoarder moves is cars by digging them out from under the old wall paper rolls and packing crates and hooking a chain to them. 
A stockpiler is just trying to keep them away from the hoarders. 

Also add a 'stockpiler' is one who actually makes money off of them.  The root word, 'stock', in commercial terms does mean 'goods for sale or distribution'.

 

True, many collectors do profit from a sale of one, but a collector's main intention is to enjoy it, and have fun with it while in his possession.  

 

Craig

[TAKerry]

9 hours ago, Angelfish said:

A collector moves his cars by starting and driving them.

A hoarder moves is cars by digging them out from under the old wall paper rolls and packing crates and hooking a chain to them. 
A stockpiler is just trying to keep them away from the hoarders. 

Close analogy, but I think youre wrong on the hoarder. They wont move anything. Once its in place it stays there until a collector hooks up the chain.

[60FlatTop]

18 hours ago, TAKerry said:

literally a path from the front door to a chair, and a path to the kitchen. Everything else was stacked high with newspapers and the like. 

 

That sounds like the true definition of a literal path. If left unchecked mine would be books, but no less literary.

 

The argument of comparing to worse situations is usually non-convincing but fun. I once knew a man who talked about living in a cardboard box under a bridge. He said there was a poor old bum who lived under the same bridge. The old bum only had a makeshift bench and a few newspapers to cover himself with. My friend said he would look out of his box at the guy and think "I'd never let myself get that bad".

[TAKerry]

Sounds like my 2 older brothers with books. My oldest brother retired out of the Army, I helped him move a couple times when he was stationed nearby. He had (and prob still does) hundreds of hundreds of books. Hardly anything else. I was never so sick of moving boxes full of them. 

 

Must be a theme, as a couple of years ago I looked at a prospective job. It was for an officer in the Army ( I live near an army base, LOL) that had just bought a big house. He wanted shelving built in the finished basement which was about 1200sf to hold his books. The place was packed to the ceiling.

[60FlatTop]

Definition of sanctity: A book or tool interstitually held safely between usage.

 

Ex-Navy, married the librarian.

[8E45E]

55 minutes ago, 60FlatTop said:

Definition of sanctity: A book or tool interstitually held safely between usage.

 

Ex-Navy, married the librarian.

If they are books & magazines on cars, them and scale models probably the next best thing to owning the real items.   They take a lot less space, and can be enjoyed in the comfort of your living room parlor.

 

Craig

[Jack_Vines]

Some hoarders enjoy having something others want.   A local hoarder bought three collectable cars back when they were just orphan used cars.  He parked them and for forty years, his social life was fielding calls and visits from guys who wanted to buy one or all of them.  The hoarder never had the money or the health to restore any of them, but he sure enjoyed teasing those who wanted to buy them.  Even though he had no intention of selling, he'd dicker, talk, take offers and promise to think about it.  When he passed away, his children sold all three cars before he was cold in the ground and for less money than he'd been offered numerous times.

 

jack vines

[TTR]

23 hours ago, Jack_Vines said:

Some hoarders enjoy having something others want.   A local hoarder bought three collectable cars back when they were just orphan used cars.  He parked them and for forty years, his social life was fielding calls and visits from guys who wanted to buy one or all of them.  The hoarder never had the money or the health to restore any of them, but he sure enjoyed teasing those who wanted to buy them.  Even though he had no intention of selling, he'd dicker, talk, take offers and promise to think about it.  When he passed away, his children sold all three cars before he was cold in the ground and for less money than he'd been offered numerous times.

 

jack vines

Based on my limited experience and general observations, above assessment probably fits 90% (or more) of self-proclaimed/so-called car collectors, to a “T”.