The Missing (Henry) Link

OH HENRY! I still miss you SO much (cue the tissues).

So…it’s no secret that I’m a huge vintage Henry Link fan. I could still kick myself (often & very hard) for the HL piece that got away. I bought this piece for my college age son’s bedroom. He was a sophomore in college and sharing a house with 3 other friends. He had the largest bedroom and he needed a good bit of furniture to make it nice (according to me anyway). There was room for not only bedroom furniture but also a full-on living area type setup. That room really was massive! Me being who I am…of course, it couldn’t just be any old furniture. Cool furniture only for my son obvi (insert eye roll)!

Cut to after that sophomore year when it was time for him to move into the frat house for the next 2 years. He was a fraternity officer and all officers must live in the frat house (or so I was told, another eye roll). Everything he had in his big room at the house of course was moved into his frat house room (another really, oddly huge room btw-big living room area included there as well).

Unfortunately, we did NOT know until after the fact that the room he was moving into was still occupied for another week (FRATS!) so my son & husband stored his furniture & basically everything in a storage room (old, creepy basement really) and I headed back home (3 hour drive) with our pup (frat boys moving in & out and pups didn’t seem the safest idea).

A week later when we ALL drove the 3 hours back over to set up his space (leaving our pup safely at home with a pet sitter). We pulled up to the frat house nice & early and immediately noticed once we made our way to where they left all of his belongings, that the Henry Link was missing?!?! MISSING! Gone. Girl. Gone.

Oddly my husband & son didn’t seem to think anything about this and at first said “it’s here somewhere”, “it must have things on top covering it”. They just didn’t get it (or care). It felt off! I knew in my heart it had been taken. Everything else of his was there after all.

Unbeknownst to me…this basement is also a place where frat bros leave things they don’t want any longer. You know, like frat boy graduates & moves on, buys better furniture, etc., etc., etc. OR just shops the frat basement I guess. Who knew?

I’m sure it wasn’t intentionally stolen (not really but…). I hope that someone took somethings they no longer wanted down to the basement and assumed someone had left the HL piece. You’d think they would have asked around first but if you know anything about frats, that’s not exactly how it always works. All sorts of things grow legs to never be seen again I later learned.

I doubt seriously a frat bro would know anything about Henry Link. They would just know it was a really cool piece (most likely looks great in their new digs). Either that or someone’s girlfriend who was studying Interior Design at the University spotted it for her boyfriend (or wait…herself maybe, hmmmm). It’s just too hard to imagine ANY girlfriend or mom being brave enough to go down in that basement though. I don’t see that really being the case.

What’s clearer than anything is how crazy I was to give my son a Henry Link in the first place much less allow him to take it to a frat house?!?! CraCra. I mean honestly.

BTW, this is not a frat bashing session. My father, brother & son were all frat bros (oddly all 3 different ones too, my brother & son wanted to do their own thing and not ride in on legacies they said). Not to mention that different decades & colleges change so much when it comes to Greek life many times so being a legacy isn’t always ideal.

IF anything this is a lesson to all parents, especially moms Hell Bent on nicely decorating their son’s space. DO NOT decorate with nice, valuable furniture/anything. Much less valuable Vintage Furniture! Save those pieces for yourself or hold on to them until they grow out of the frat house and get a job and you know they’ll appreciate & take care of the pieces. AND not be in a situation where a piece of furniture would EVER be taken.

That Henry Link piece still gets to me! I hope whoever took it actually appreciates it and is taking good care of it. I still search for it today when I’m out sourcing furniture. It has a distinctive (yet tiny) mark on it that I purposely put on it just in case. See, I should have followed my instincts!!! Somewhere deep down I had a feeling I should mark it so I knew that it was going to go missing I think. THE Missing Link!

I would never mark a vintage piece of furniture much less my beloved Henry Link but I never saw us reselling it. I thought it would keep moving along with my son or I’d bring it home one day.

I haven’t given up looking. Who knows? It may resurface one day. I’ll never give up, it’s the principle of it all at this point.

Who knows, maybe it has been painted & sold a few times by now. I prefer to envision it living its best life still in its perfect, untouched condition & truly loved in someone’s nice home. Just the way it was taken (sigh).

I’ll keep you posted if it ever shows up somewhere. Who knows, maybe someone reading this has it and will feel remorse and reach out. Stranger things have happened!

A women (moi) once upon a time bought a pristine, vintage Henry Link chest for her college age son who then got it stolen from a frat house so….me finding it again one day isn’t the weirdest thing, right?

~Scarlett (The Big Dummy)

(PS) Dorm Life his freshman year was SO much easier because basic furnishings were included & everyone had the same dorm “stuff”. Nobody wanted it but you had to use it. No switcharoo’s allowed (trust me, I asked).

Bring your bedding, towels, toiletries, clothes, your mini-fridge, your tv, your laptop & school supplies and…done. He even had his own private bathroom and was in a single room with an amazing view out of a window that took up an entire wall of his room. It was a great room in a great dorm.

Guess it would have been too much to ask for him to stay in that nice, big, single, awesome view, furnished dorm room for 4 years.

A sacrifice that would have saved my dear Henry!

Not the actual Henry Link Chest in question but…just so you get the vibe. Bamboo Vibe that is. My missing Henry Link was much darker AND in pristine condition (no wonder it was taken)!