Please, do not melt down historic items for scrap. That's what people have done since the Spanish melted down all the Aztec art and sacred pieces in the 1500s. Today it's silver and now I see pewter. To make 10% more than you pay, you destroy antiques? If they're not antiques, I guess it's ok, but I see some in these photos.
Many (most) collecting worlds bemoan what has been lost "...in the great WWI scrap drives...WWII drives...during the 1950s when nowbody cared about ..." etc, etc. We lose more history every antique fair, as scrappers prowl around grabbing up every sterling hat pin or baby cup...all to sell and melt into ingots? It's sick.
I bought a ABP crystal bowl yesterday at an antique fair. It had a black metal rim. I knew what it was, the seller, nor the scrappers did. It's rim was Sterling. But better yet for me, a historian, it is Gorham silver, hallmark dates it to 1898. It took a worker 2 days at cutting and polishing to make this in the 1800s. He had good wages and was middle class. Today it's worth about $250. I paid $10. A scrapper whould have broken the crystal bowl to get at the silver rim, ripped it off the shards, and gotten....$18.
