Can You Resell Yearbooks?
Surprisingly, Yes. Vintage and antique high school, college and university yearbooks are best to pick up for reselling, and can normally be found pretty cheaply at estate sales. You can also pick them up at auction, storage unit auctions, garage sales, and rarely a thrift.
What makes them valuable?
Most famous people went to High School and some even went to college. Finding a year book with someone famous in it can yield a huge return like this 1953 high school year book with a young Elvis Presley and signed by him that went for $7500.00! Even if there isn’t a famous person that went to the school, sometimes they still have pictures of famous people that gave speeches or performed at the school, like this 1969 College of William and Mary year book.
Nixon campaigning for the presidency.
Marvin Gaye giving a concert at William and Mary.
What if no one famous is in it, is it still worth something?
The film and tv industry will purchase these both as props to give authenticity to period pieces and also as set and costume inspiration, because a year book is a great time capsule for both the period and the place. A year book from a NYC school in the Bronx is going to be filled with vastly different styles and values than one from Salt Lake City, Utah in the same time period. In addition, scrapbookers will sometimes purchase them for decoration on their own memory books. Alumni that couldn’t afford to buy a year book at the time, or maybe had their lost or damaged will purchase them for sentimentality reasons.
Protesting the Vietnam War on the William & Mary campus. Gives a great snap shot on wardrobe, mood, atmosphere of the time.
I recently sold this William and Mary yearbook from 1969 that I picked at a hoarder house for FREE in January, which you can watch here. I sold it for my full asking price on eBay plus shipping, and after fees, I made a total of $24.62. Again, if you can find them cheap enough, I highly recommend picking them up. They are a long tail item, meaning they will take awhile to sell (this one took eight months), but they are easy to list and photograph.
