The cafe’s owner, Timothée Mottin, found about a dozen newspapers dating from January 20 and 21, 1966 near the Bossons Glacier in southeastern France, he told CNN.
The newspapers are “in very good condition, you can read them, unfold them,” he said. “Well, they are a little torn, but in a very good condition.”
The Bossons Glacier is the largest ice fall in Europe, according to the French government, and descends from the summit of Mont Blanc, the highest mountain in Western Europe.
Mottin has owned the Cabane du Cerro restaurant cafe, one hour from the ski town of Chamonix, for the past five years.
The business is right next to the glacier at an altitude of over 4,400 feet, and Mottin often finds objects on the ice.
“As the glacier progresses, it brings with it objects from the top of Mont Blanc,” he said.
However, Mottin added, it is quite rare to find newspapers, especially these at once.
“For now, newspapers will be shown in the restaurant / cabin that is right next to the glacier, and then, we’ll see, maybe I will hand it over to a museum,” he said.
One of the newspapers is the January 20 issue of the National Herald of India, which announces the election of Indira Gandhi as the country’s first prime minister.
Newspapers may have been on board an Air India Boeing 707 called “Kanchenjunga” that crashed on Mont Blanc on January 24, 1966, killing 117.
Another Indian aircraft, the Malabar Princess, crashed in the area in 1950, killing all 48 people on board.
Debris from the wreckage emerges from the bottom of the glacier, including metal, wire and even a landing gear discovered in 1986, according to a Mont Blanc tourist site.
It is unclear which plane had carried the gems.
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