Pawn Stars

Within the past few months, I have become obsessed with the television show Pawn Stars. For those of you who haven't seen it, Pawn Stars is a show about a pawn story in Las Vegas. People will bring in items to pawn them or to sell them. To pawn an item, the person puts their item as collateral to get a certain amount of money. They have 90 days to pay back the balance and the interest. If the balance is not played, the pawn shop is allowed to sell the item.
The main reason I love the show is the stories. People bring in these items and tell what each item means. Depending on the item, they may have to get an expert to come look over the items. That's when it gets really interesting. If there is a historical object, they have a museum expert come and determine if it is legitimate. If the object is real, one of the workers will negotiate a price with the person.
On the episode I watched recently, someone brought in a Civil War diary to sell. A Civil War diary! As a public historian I was enraged. First by the fact that they were handling the diaries with their bare hands. That is a bad thing to do because it will deteriorate. If I knew they had washed their hands before handling the diaries, I would have been less upset. The other thing is that the person wanted to sell a family heirloom. I do understand that times are tough but I am an advocate of donating that kind of stuff to museums or archives. For instant, Wright State University's  Special Collection and Archives is a place that takes those kinds of donations. This is my own personal opinion when it comes to artifacts. However I feel about what people do with their artifacts, I love watching Pawn Stars. It is a good way to see how people can make a living in history outside of the academic field.