The Collyer brothers' Harlem hoard and booby-trapped mansion

Brothers Homer and Langley Collyer were found dead in March 1947 in their Harlem brownstone, where police uncovered an enormous hoard of books, newspapers, furniture, and mechanical booby traps that impeded access to parts of the house. The discovery, at the residence where they had lived for decades, drew national attention and has been cited in histories of hoarding and urban oddities. The house and its circumstances are well documented in contemporary newspaper accounts and later historical studies.