52 Ancestors: Favorite Discovery

This weeks' blog prompt is Favorite Discovery.  Like most people researching their family, there isn't just one favorite discovery.  I have a few "top" discoveries but since I've written about them before, I'll just share a link to those posts.

Emery Waller's grave is marked

Bertha's bracelet

Generations photo

So today I'm taking the liberty of changing the prompt to Favorite Discovery TODAY.  Because if I open a box or letter tomorrow, I'll have a new favorite discovery.

This morning I went into the storage closet to retrieve another batch of the letters my grandfather wrote to my grandmother from 1916-1919.  I've transcribed all of the letters she wrote to him but I'm still working - slowly - on the letters he wrote to her.  And there I saw a box marked MISC LEVY PHOTOS.  When I've found photos that I can't identify or don't want to think about I put them in a miscellaneous box by surname.  Over the years I've pulled some out, scanned them, and put them in archival boxes.  Seems pretty organized - if they're in the box they're scanned - and if that's all the photos I had, I would agree.  But I have SO MANY photos that it's just overwhelming to move forward.  Hey, I still have the letters to transcribe.

So I opened the MISC LEVY box and there on the top was this photo.

 This really isn't a "new" photo as I've seen it before and have shared it before.

Old Family Home
Located on Van Ness Ave between Kern and Inyo opposite Hotel
Californian.  Built 1887
Picture taken about 1890 shows Herbert, Leon and Sig

Close up showing Goldie (Benas) and Herman Levy
Herbert, Leon and Sig Levy
Sig is my paternal grandfather

The two photos are identical, although it's puzzling to me how it looks to be printed on material not typically found in the late 1800's.  Did someone somehow make a copy of it?

And then I did something I always forget to do when I'm sure what I'm looking at - I turned the photo over.  I don't know, maybe it was already turned over and the writing on the back is what caught my eye.

It says pretty much the same thing except that this includes the address, 946 K Street.  But what really makes it a favorite discovery is that the handwriting is my grandfather's.  Remember those letters I'm slowly but surely transcribing?  After the hours upon hours I've been reading his handwriting there is absolutely no question that this is Sig's handwriting.

Okay, so maybe not the most exciting discovery of all time but it sure is the most exciting thing I've found today.  Now back to the letters...