This Apple iPad 8 had been around in a family for years with regular use as a secondary device, with years of pictures built up on the device. As I understand it, it got dropped screen-first on an object during a move, cracking both the digitizer glass and destroying the LCD panel.
Since Apple devices require the passcode to be entered in order to do any backups or access data on the device, all the years of photos were stranded on the device. In this era the digitizer glass and LCD are actually separate parts, so the hardest part was just waiting for both parts to come in.
The broken glass facilitated the screen coming off quite easily, and after a quick transplant of the home button, it was put back together and working fine!
