Goodwill customer buys a jazz record for $3, but what she found inside was a piece of history

Thrifting has become a viable way not just to save money but also to earn profits by reselling cheap finds for their actual value online. Although people look for limited edition or designer apparel and jewelry, they have even come across things like ancient vases worth millions. A Minnesota shopper too found a unique treasure during a recent trip to Goodwill.  Angelina Palumbo, who picked up a $3 jazz record from the store got the shock of her life when she discovered a piece of history hidden inside the envelope.

One fine day, Palumbo was on a routine trip to her local Goodwill store, a place she often visits. "I love Goodwill. I try to find things thrifted and give new purpose to them,” Palumbo said, speaking to WCCO CBS Minnesota. The thrift shopper is a collector of vinyl records and that day, she was looking for jazz records to add to her collection. 

Looking through the shelves she found something that got her interested. Upon looking at it, she found two small records tucked inside one larger album. “I thought Rock On! Two records for the price of one," she said in the interview. After closer inspection, Palumbo noticed that there was a mail envelope with handwritten messages. She further found similar writings on the smaller records and realized they were voice messages exchanged between a husband and his wife from 1954. “It says on the envelope he was in the Air Force.”

Palumbo shared that In the message, the husband could be heard saying that he loves and misses his wife, and thinks about her often. “You, my darling, I say we can be together,” the messages from the husband note. 

Palumbo added that she believed that the messages from the wife said that she worked in the new armory back in the States. “I got the letters from you the other day…” the wife’s message played.

Given how special the messages were, Palumbo tried to trace the family of the loving husband and wife, to return the records. However, her efforts on social media haven't yielded any results as of January 18, according to CBS.

"I tried looking them up on Facebook," she said. "I just haven't been able to find anybody to contact because I don't know if their family is still in Minnesota or they're out in California." The thrifter hoped that the media coverage and the story on social media would reach the family and help reunite them with the recordings.

She shared that she lost her grandparents at a young age so she knows how valuable it would be. "I know if I was his family, I would give a lot to hear my grandparents talk about each other," she said. She explained that the records were from a pre-voicemail and pre-social media era, and the family must not have realized what they were when they donated them to Goodwill.

"I think they might have cleared out a house and it was stuffed in a record, I think they just did not know," she added.