Photos saved from Liverpool skip reveal 'mysterious' man's life
- Published
A man who rescued a suitcase of photos from a skip has said he wants to find the owner's family because they "belong back with his relatives".
Ollie Catherall, from Liverpool, said he found the "treasure trove" while building work was being done on the home of his late neighbour Evan Thomas.
He said Mr Thomas, who died in 2020, "kept himself to himself", but the images showed he loved his family.
Looking through them was like "visiting a bite-size museum", he added.
The 31-year-old moved to Queensdale Road in Mossley Hill with his partner in February 2020.
He said he had spoken "once or twice" to Mr Thomas, who he believed had been in his late 70s, but there had been a "commotion" in the following weeks and an ambulance was seen at his neighbour's home.
He said he believed Mr Thomas had suffered a bad fall and later died in hospital.
A month later, builders clearing out Mr Thomas's house told him his neighbour had died "without friends or family by his side".
"It was upsetting," Mr Catherall told BBC North West Tonight.
"The whole neighbourhood was quite shocked."
He said when he saw the suitcase discarded in a skip outside Mr Thomas's former home, "curiosity got the better of me" and he took it home.
"I opened it up and it was a treasure trove, with the all the photographs and faces staring back at me," he said.
"It's like looking through a time bubble."
Mr Catherall and some of his neighbours have since tried to piece together Mr Thomas's life.
He said some of the photographs show a family post office which he had traced back to Dolwyddelan in Wales, while others showed people at the beach in Formby or Blackpool, but his former neighbour's family history was "very mysterious".
"We have got a rough timeline but nothing concrete," he said.
"Whatever had happened between him and his family, this trunk goes to show he held them close to him."
He added that he would love to hear from anyone knew anything about the photographs or Mr Thomas's life, as "these photographs do not belong with me, they belong back with his relatives".