Anne Frank’s Toys Found by Old Childhood Playmate

She asked her neighbor to safeguard them shortly before she went into hiding

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Netherlands Anne Frank's Marbles
Anne Frank House Amsterdam / AP

This Nov. 14, 2013 photo provided by the Anne Frank House Amsterdam on Tuesday, Feb. 4, 2014, shows a set of marbles belonging to Anne Frank.

Before Anne Frank went into hiding, she asked her neighbor, a young playmate, to safeguard a few personal belongings until she returned.

Some 70 years later, that same neighbor, Toosje Kupers, discovered those items, a tin of marbles, a book and a tea set, moldering in the attic. CNN reports that she promptly donated them to the Anne Frank House Museum. The marbles went on display Wednesday at the Kunsthal art gallery in Rotterdam.

According to the Washington Post, Kupers said that Anne Frank had told her she was worried the marbles “might fall into the wrong hands” and asked her friend to “keep them for a little while.” Her family was betrayed by an informant and deported to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, where she died of typhus in 1944. “The marbles are a reminder that she was just a little girl,” said Teresien da Silva, museum head of collections.

[CNN]