i am using the paper bobbin things ....they make them for industrial machines .....and the aunt martha transfers work good on color crayon quilts also

Some of your spools are from the Belding company who made good quality threads including silk thread. My mother who is now almost 94 used to use heavy weight Belding thread for sewing on buttons when she made clothes and other Belding threads for clothing construction.

I was a tailor and it looks like silk top stitching thread. You would make the wool suit jacket and then top stitch with silk to make it look professional. Silk is usually very strong. You would not need a lot on a spool just to top stitch so it usually came on the smaller ones. If you find it breaks easily, don't use it. Instead, get an old green canning jar and put all the thread in. Set it on a shelf and enjoy the pretty colors of days-gone-by.

On the wooden ones.... I have a bunch of them from my Great Aunt Sally. Most are silk buttonhole twist. I finally had to go to YouTube to find out how to do handmade buttonholes to use them. It truly is beautiful stuff if you're into that sort of thing! I'm sure you could use it for embroidery as well - with those iron-on transfers. There just isn't much on a each one. And THEN - sell the wooden spools!

Well I checked the tread.. And it is all still good.. Does not break easy at all!

Don't know about the thread and bobbins. When I find old Aunt Martha iron on it copy them then trace them onto muslin. If they are really old the transfers may not come through then you have lost a pattern.

I used paper bobbins in my Babylock embroidery machine sometimes.

I also display my old wooden in a jar.

I have a lot of "stuff" that came from my grandmother. One of the things is a Singer sewing book. I plan to make this book the focal point in a shadow box and add some of the wooden spools, buttons (still on the cards) trims (still on the cards), a card with thread color samples, etc etc.

The Aunt Martha transfers will probably still be good. In my family the women saved all the sugar sacks, flour sacks, etc and turned them into dish cloths or pillow cases. All of these would have had hand embroidery using transfers such as these.

Iron one should still work but give it a try. Good luck. Nice collection.