Standing 13 feet high, this scarce two-sided neon sign advertises both Oldsmobile and Cadillac. Image courtesy Showtime Auction Service.ANN ARBOR, Mich. – After skipping its customary live spring sale to conduct a catalog auction, Showtime Auction Services will return this fall to stage a remarkable three-day event, Oct. 2-4, with the entire collection of Ronald G. Wallace, former president of shipping giant UPS. LiveAuctioneers.com will provide Internet live bidding.
Wallace has turned his focus to opening a chain of Celtic Pubs and serving as a captain of the Alpharetta, Ga., police department. The pubs are decorated with original antique fixtures, and Wallace has found that searching for these fixtures has replaced his desire to continue growing his collection of fine antiques.
In addition to this fabulous collection will be about 1,000 other lots of investment-grade antiques and collectibles from several other prominent collectors. The auction is scheduled for the weekend of Oct. 2-4. The auction will be held at the Washtenaw Farm Council Grounds, 5055 Ann Arbor-Saline Road in Ann Arbor, Mich.
Wallace, is a larger-than-life figure, maintains a 44,000-square-foot home in suburban Atlanta. It’s where he houses his massive collection of vintage advertising, gambling, saloon, brothel, country store and general store items – 800 lots in all. These are displayed in a mind boggling, full-scale replica of Tombstone, Ariz., as it existed in 1892.
Wallace enlisted Rick Clark who has done work for Six Flags of America to construct 14 storefront facades for one wing of his home. It consists of more than 200 running feet and stands 27 feet tall. Other great items will include a Brunswick Balke & Collander front and back bar, circa 1890. This is the desirable mahogany L.A. model, featuring two hand-carved, full-bodied nudes and matching liquor cabinet.
The sale will also feature gambling, toys, advertising, barber shop, country store, soda fountain, paintings, Western memorabilia, coin-op, trade signs, folk art and many other surprises, about 1,800 lots in all. Phone, Internet and absentee bids will be accepted on Saturday and Sunday but only live audience members can bid on Friday.
One lot sure to turn heads is a Moxiemobile car, a later replica of the vehicles first created in 1915 by Frank Archer to advertise and promote the soft drink Moxie. Originally known as the Moxie Horsemobile, there were several Moxiemobiles on American roads in the 1930s, mainly in parades. The example to be sold is a Rolls Royce version Moxiemobile with a Ford engine. It’s in excellent condition.
Advertising signs include a National Fine Beers tin sign (New Orleans, La.), made by Kaufmann & Strauss Co. and dated 1893; a rare Jeweled Cigar trade sign with two-side light-up, quite possibly the only one of its kind; and a hard-to-find Oldsmobile and Cadillac neon porcelain sign, two-sided, in excellent working condition. The sign is approximately 13 feet high.
From the vintage toys group, expected top lots include an all-original Buddy L water tower fire truck, one of the most difficult 1920s fire trucks to find, with a real working pumper that can spray water up to 25 feet; a Sturdy Toy 1920s dairy tanker pressed steel tractor and trailer; an unusual 1920s Keystone pressed steel Packard tank truck with a yellow tank; and a toy 1954 Mercury convertible car with a travel trailer.
Other anticipated top lots include a rare Caille Centaur 50-cent upright slot machine with mahogany cabinet and nickel-plated trim, in excellent working condition; a Red Wing Grape Juice bottle topper boasting fabulous color and featuring graphics of a boy and a girl; and a rare Black Americana mechanical fishing boy. When it’s plugged in, the figure’s head nods and his eyes move back and forth.
A preview will be held on Friday, Oct. 2, from 8 a.m. to noon, with a free hot breakfast served from 8 to a.m. to 10 a.m. The auction that day will run from noon to 5 p.m. for a live audience only; no Internet bidding. On Saturday and Sunday (Oct. 3-4), previews will be held from 8-9 a.m. The auction on Saturday, Oct. 3, will run 9-5; on Sunday, Oct. 4, the auction hours are from 9-4. Internet, phone and left bids will be accepted on Saturday and Sunday.
For details call Michael Eckles of Showtime Auction Services at (951) 453-2415.
View the fully illustrated catalogs and sign up to bid absentee or live via the Internet during the sale at www.LiveAuctioneers.com.
This is a later replica of the famous Moxiemobile, an advertising vehicle that promoted the bold, fresh soft drink Moxie. Image courtesy Showtime Auction Service. Kaufman & Strauss Co. produced this tin sign advertising National Fine Beers, New Orleans, which is dated 1893. Image courtesy Showtime Auction Service. This rare double roulette table by B.C. Willis Co. of Detroit is one of only three known. Image courtesy Showtime Auction Service. Shoppers were attracted to dramatic and colorful Winchester three-dimensional die-cut cardboard store window displays. Only 13 Consumers Brewing Co. label under glass display mugs are known to exist. Eight are in this auction. Image courtesy Showtime Auction Service. Embellished with German silver, this Impressive Ted Flowers parade saddle cost $3,000 in 1956. Image courtesy Showtime Auction Service. This replica of Tombstone, Ariz., has more than over 200 running feet of storefront. Image courtesy Showtime Auction Service.
Rookwood 1903 painted matte vase by Olga G. Reed, 11¼ inches, with red maple leaves on a shaded indigo ground, estimate: $2,000-$3,000. Image courtesy Rago’s.
LAMBERTVILLE, N.J. – Rago’s will launch its 2009-2010 auction season with a double-header auction of Roseville and Craftsman/early 20th-century design. The Craftsman auction, with a great number of lots for design- and budget-conscious buyers, is set for Saturday, Sept. 26 at noon Eastern Time, following a 400-lot sale of Roseville and other Ohio potteries that will be conducted on the day prior – Friday, Sept. 25, also commencing at noon. Internet live bidding will be available through www.LiveAuctioneers.com.
“This is a sale of original work by early 20th-century designers, at reasonable prices. The value is tremendous, with strong property priced to sell,” said David Rago. “The Roseville sale brings back a Rago perennial for the fans.”
American Art pottery is, as ever, a strong suit at Rago’s. Headline lots include several exceptional vases. Lot 631 is a large Grueby vase with two rows of tooled and applied full-height leaves covered in matte green glaze, estimated at $3,000-$5,000. Lot 904 is a John Bennett vase, painted with white daffodils. This rare and early vase was made in 1877, the first year Bennett set up shop on Lexington Avenue in Manhattan. It is signed J. Bennett 101 Lex Ave. NY. JB/77, and is estimated at $1,000-$1,500.
Lot 857 is a Teco rare ovoid vase with ridges in matte green glaze. Lot 601 is a 1903 Rookwood painted matte vase by Olga G. Reed, estimated at $2,000-$3,000. It has red maple leaves on a shaded indigo ground.
Lot 773 consists of five Doulton (Lambeth) stoneware decorated pitchers, sprigged-on or cameo. Two of the pitchers read: “Bread at Pleasure, Drink by Measure” and “Those who have money are troubled about it, those who have none, are troubled without it.” The others have dining or hunting scenes. They are all marked and are estimated to fetch $500-$750 for the group.
Lot 861 is a 1943 North Dakota School of Mines covered jar carved by Irene Nelson, with serpents and Prairie rose, estimated at $2,500-3,500.
Also look for a good collection of Southern face jugs and ugly jugs, notably lot 782, a Lanier Meaders face jug with granite teeth and matte and glossy dark green glaze. It is signed Lanier Meaders and is estimated at $1,000-1,500.
Arts & Crafts furniture of import includes a Limbert vanity (lot 930) with three drawers and a three-paneled mirror and a branded mark, estimated at $1,000-$1,500, and an L. & J.G. Stickley even-arm settle (lot 817) with a wide back rail, tall post legs and side slats. It is signed “The Work of L. & J.G. Stickley,” and is estimated at $1,900-$2,700.
The sale features art glass in the leading styles of the time. Among the best is lot 1036, a Lalique Ambrefor D’Orsay perfume bottle. The glass is clear and frosted with a blue patina, and is estimated at $1,000-$1,500.
Also of note, lot 1021, a Steuben gold Aurene footed vase with an applied enameled heart and vine decoration, is estimated at $2,000-$3,000. Lot 950 is an Arts & Crafts large stained glass window with stylized trees in a landscape, mounted in its original window frame, estimated at $1,200-$1,700.
This sale showcases a variety of lighting fixtures. Lot 984 is a Handel table lamp with an etched glass shade obverse- and reverse-painted with a landscape against a vermillion sky over a three-socket lobed base, estimated at $4,500-$6,500. Lot 981 is a Bradley & Hubbard large leaded-glass chandelier that features pink tulips and green foliage on an amber ground. It is estimated to fetch $1,750-$2,250.
Also of note: woodblock prints, paintings and drawings, including lot 811, a Frances Gearhart color woodblock print depicting seagulls on a dock with sailboats in the distance, estimated at $600-$800; and lot 946, three framed watercolors by George Hardy Payne. Payne was a student of Louis Comfort Tiffany. His studio in Paterson, N.J., was one of the most productive clerical stained-glass window companies in the United States, and is responsible for all 11 Patriarchal windows added in 1922 to the north side of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Paterson. The watercolors are renderings of the stained-glass window designs for St. Paul’s, which consist of two vertical arch designs and one roundel. The lot is estimated at $900-$1,200.
Art tiles always figure in a Craftsman sale and this one is no exception. Buyers can choose from a number of fine examples of Grueby tiles, including three from a set: lot 638, which portrays a bird swooping down on green waves; lot 637, seagulls and buoy; and lot 636, an ivory rabbit in cabbage field. All are decorated in cuenca and are estimated to fetch $750-$1,000. There are also several rare Saturday Evening Girls tiles such as lot 835, The Badger House; and lot 834, Mather-Eliot House. Both have a Paul Revere stamp and are estimated at $1,000-$1,500.
Metalwork of the period is represented by several Arts & Crafts pieces, including lot 978, a hammered copper hood embossed with a revolver, riveted along its edges, estimated at $700-$900; and lot 803, a Liberty Cymric sterling silver picture frame with four turquoise cabochons designed by Archibald Knox, circa 1905, estimated at $1,750-$2,250.
Friday’s sale of Ohio potteries includes makers Roseville, Weller, McCoy, and Peters and Reed, as well as a group of tiles from the region. Among the pottery highlights are several exceptional Roseville vases:
Pauleo is a popular Arts & Crafts pattern introduced by Roseville Pottery in 1914. The designers used numerous glazes with Pauleo, including lustrous, matte mottled colors, and semi-gloss blends. Most Pauleo pieces were without ornamentation, and lot 327 is no exception. It is a rare, large floor vase with matte green and raspberry red mottled glaze, estimated at $5,000-$6,000.
Orian is a middle-period Art Deco pattern introduced by Roseville Pottery in 1935. Lots 142 and 143 are tall Orian vases in yellow and red, estimated at $450-$650 each. Lot 314 is from Roseville’s Rozane line. It is finely painted with a dog portrait, estimated at $750-$1,000. Roseville’s Baneda line was introduced in 1933. Lot 113 is a green Baneda estimated at $1,000-$1,500. Lot 15 is from the short-lived Azurean line dating to 1920. It has a painting of a large sailboat by Anthony Dunleavy and is estimated to fetch $1,000-$1,500. Lot 22 is a rare and exceptional red Carnelian II ”Beehive” vase (which is also known to some collectors as Carnelian III), estimated at $5,000-$7,000.
The sale also contains several Roseville wall pockets, including some from the highly sought-after lines of Tourist and Sunflower. Lot 8, a rare Tourist, is estimated at $4,000-$6,000. Lot 294, Sunflower, is estimated at $600-$900.
Other notable Roseville items include lot 329, a Dogwood I umbrella stand, which is a nice, large example of an Arts & Crafts line, estimated at $700-$900. Lot 359 is a brown Primrose sand jar, estimated at $500-$700; and lot 131 is a rare tan Artcraft 8-inch jardiniere and pedestal, estimated at $1,400-$1,800.
Roseville’s Della Robbia line was introduced in 1906; the hand-carved pieces are scarce and highly sought after by collectors. Lot 1 is a unique and large experimental covered jar, carved and enamel-decorated by artist Helen Smith with clematis vines in lavenders, greens, and ivory. Despite several shallow firing lines and glaze scaling, the piece is estimated to fetch $5,000-$7,000. Lot 29 is a rare Della Robbia mug, enamel-decorated with a band of blossoms, leaves and a verse from the poet Omar Khayyam’s Rubaiyat: ”Perplext no more with Human or Divine, To-morrow’s tangle to the winds resign, And lose your fingers in the tresses of The Cypress-slender Minister of Wine.” It is estimated at $1,000-$1,500.
Weller Pottery began production in 1872. The Weller Sicard line, made by Frenchman Jacques Sicard from 1902 to 1907, is one of Weller’s most sought-after patterns. Lot 39 is a Weller Sicard 6-inch bud vase, perfectly fired with stars on burgundy ground, estimated at $600-$900.
Weller Hudson was developed in the late teens to early 1920s and to this day remains among the highest quality, hand-decorated pottery ever produced. Lot 36 is a fine and rare Weller Hudson scenic 6-inch bud vase, the only one we know of with rabbits, estimated at $1,000-$1,500.
The Weller Woodcraft and Muskota lines are extremely popular with Arts & Crafts pottery collectors. Lot 56 is a rare Weller Woodcraft 15½-inch vase with an owl in apple tree, estimated at $600-$800.
Other Weller pieces to note are: lot 200, from the Jap Birdmal or Rhead Faience line, an 18-inch vase painted in squeezebag with a geisha, estimated at $700-$1,000; and, lot 48, a rare, life-size Garden Ware running rabbit, estimated at $800-$1,200. Weller pottery ceased production in early 1948.
Several of the sale’s Zanesville tiles are from the American Encaustic Tiling Co., and were featured in the seminal 1972 book, Zanesville Art Tile in Color, by Evan and Louise Purviance, including: lot 370, an exceptional oversize advertising tile with an Elizabethan gentleman smoking a pipe at a table, covered in matte caramel and ivory glaze, estimated at $2,000-$3,000; and, lot 371, a rare and large pair of grate tiles with putti within ribbon and foliate design, covered in matte turquoise glaze, estimated at $1,500-$2,000.
For information on any decorative-art lot in the sale, contact David Rago or Suzanne Perrault at 609-397-9374 or e-mail info@ragoarts.com. For furniture enquiries, call Jerry Cohen at 800-448-7828 or e-mail jerry@craftsman-auctions.com. View the fully illustrated catalog and sign up to bid absentee or live via the Internet through www.LiveAuctioneers.com.
Grueby vase with three full-height tooled and applied leaves covered in fine frothy matte green glaze, 7¾ inches, estimate: $2,500-$3,500. Image courtesy Rago’s. Handel table lamp with faceted, leaded-glass shade painted and overlaid with blooming trees, over a three-socket fluted copper base, estimate $2,000-$3,000. Image courtesy Rago’s. L. & J.G. Stickley two-door bookcase (no. 645) with 12 panes per door, gallery top and keyed-through tenons, unmarked, 55¼ inches by 51 inches, estimate $3,750-$4,750. Image courtesy Rago’s. Marie Zimmermann rare brass-plated copper covered box, its lid with a dainty silver filligree medallion over an ivory finial, 3¾ inches by 8 inches, stamped M. Zimmermann Maker, estimate $800-$1,200. Image courtesy Rago’s. Signed Lainer Meaders face jug with granite teeth and matte and glossy dark green glaze, 10½ inches by 8 inches, estimate $1,000-$1,500. Image courtesy Rago’s. Lalique Ambre for D’Orsay perfume bottle in clear and frosted glass with blue patina, 5¼ inches tall, estimate $1,000-$1,500. Image courtesy Rago’s.
This costume jewelry pin that looks like a bouquet of violets was made by Mazer. The flowers are white metal covered with purple and green enamel. The 3-inch pin sold for $58 at a Morphy Auction in Denver, Pa.
Costume jewelry is among the best-selling collectibles in the United States today. Much of the costume jewelry made in the mid-20th century is well-designed and was created with materials that have lasted. Pieces usually are more durable and less expensive than modern costume jewelry. One of the well-known names in costume jewelry of the 1930s to the 1970s is Mazer. Joseph Mazer and his brother Louis founded Mazer Brothers in New York City in about 1927. Their jewelry was marked “Mazer,” “Mazer Bros.” or “Sea-Maze.” In 1940, they separated and Joseph started Joseph J. Mazer and Co., better known as Jomaz. His company marked jewelry “Jomaz,” “Joseph Mazer” or “Mazer.” It closed in 1981. Louis continued to work for the original company until 1951. That company went out of business in 1977. Flower pins, ribbon and bow pins featuring colored enamels, faux pearls and Swarovski crystals and rhinestones were among the Mazer brothers’ early designs. Sterling silver, gold-plated sterling and rhodium-plated metal were used in later pieces. All of the brothers’ jewelry was carefully made and sold originally at middle-range prices.
Q: I have an antique artificial leg with a peg foot that I was told dates from the Civil War era. It’s wooden with a hinged metal brace at the knee and a leather case that could be attached above the knee with laces.
A: You will have to take your prosthetic leg to a medical museum in your area to precisely date its origin, but it sounds as though the leg could date from the Civil War era. That’s when battlefield amputations led to extensive research in artificial limbs. In fact, one of the war’s early amputees, a Confederate soldier from Virginia named James E. Hanger, designed a leg for himself in 1861 and later founded a company to manufacture prosthetic legs. The company, now called Hanger Orthopedic Group, is based in Bethesda, Md., and makes all sorts of prosthetic devises for injured U.S. soldiers. The value of Civil War-era artificial legs ranges widely depending on several factors, including whether an expert has determined its age. We have seen them sell for hundreds into the low thousands. Some museums accept them as donations.
Q: I have an antique library table that has a mark on the bottom of the desk drawers that says “Wolverine, Detroit, 1887.” What can you tell me about this company?
A: The Wolverine Manufacturing Co. was organized by Frederick B. Smith in 1887. He started the furniture company with 12 men and $10,000. The company specialized in manufacturing library and parlor tables. By 1908 Wolverine claimed to be the largest manufacturer of its kind in the world. The company was out of business by 1919. An average-quality library table by a maker that is not well known is worth about $300 to $500 – in other words, it’s worth its “use” value.
Q: I have a vase with a circular mark on the bottom that includes the words “Arequipa, California” around a drawing of a vase under a tree. It has been in the family for years. Is it valuable?
A: Arequipa Pottery was made by patients at the Arequipa Sanatorium in Marin County, Calif., from 1911 to 1918. The sanatorium treated women and girls with tuberculosis. The pottery was established to give the patients something to do. Patients were taught by Frederick H. Rhead, a well-known potter who had worked at Roseville Pottery. Your vase has an early mark used when Rhead was there, from 1911 until 1913. Arequipa Pottery with this mark brings the highest prices today. Vases sell for hundreds to thousands of dollars.
Q: Our historical society has a woven rug that a visitor told us was a valuable “Brussels carpet.” It’s 70 x 82 inches with a seam down the middle. What can you tell us?
A: A “Brussels carpet” is a patterned carpet made of colored worsted yarns drawn up in loops through a foundation of strong linen thread. It’s named after the capital of Belgium, where this type of carpet was first made in 1799. But widespread production of Brussels carpets didn’t happen until 1849, when the Bigelow Carpet Co. was founded in Clinton, Mass. Erastus Bigelow had already invented a power loom for weaving carpets, and his additional invention of a mechanism to create patterned Brussels carpet is what helped the industry take off. Up to five colors were used in a row, but the way the colors alternated made it look like many more. Brussels carpets were much less expensive than the oriental rugs well-to-do U.S. families were using to cover floors, so the carpets could be found in middle-class as well as upper-class homes.
Tip: Maroon and yellowish chrome-green were never used to decorate porcelains during the 18th century. Another dating clue: Almost all 18th-century porcelain figures have brown eyes.
Terry Kovel answers as many questions as possible through the column. By sending a letter with a question, you give full permission for use in the column or any other Kovel forum. Names, addresses or e-mail addresses will not be published. We cannot guarantee the return of any photograph, but if a stamped envelope is included, we will try. The volume of mail makes personal answers or appraisals impossible. Write to Kovels, Auction Central News, King Features Syndicate, 300 W. 57th St., New York, NY 10019.
Need more information about collectibles? Find it at Kovels.com, our Web site for collectors. Check prices there, too. More than 700,000 are listed, and viewing them is free. You can also sign up to read our weekly “Kovels Komments.” It includes the latest news, tips and questions, and is delivered by e-mail, free, if you register. Kovels.com offers lots of collecting information and lists of publications, clubs, appraisers, auction houses, people who sell parts or repair antiques and much more. You can also subscribe to Kovels on Antiques and Collectibles, our monthly newsletter filled with prices, facts and color photos. Kovels.com adds to the information in our newspaper column and helps you find useful sources needed by collectors.
CURRENT PRICES
Current prices are recorded from antiques shows, flea markets, sales and auctions throughout the United States. Prices vary in different locations because of local economic conditions.
Plastic book-shaped Magilla Gorilla bank, by Ideal, also pictures Ricochet Rabbit, Mushmouse, Droop-a-Long Coyote, Hanna-Barbera, 1964, 4 x 6 inches, $45.
Wright & McGill Eagle Claw Lures cardboard sign, reflective lettering, blue water with fish caught on lure, Denver, 1930, 15 x 22 inches, $90.
Yogi Berra Yoo-Hoo Frozen Energy Bar sign, paper, image of Yogi holding bar, yellow ground, 1960s, 7 x 15 inches, $195.
Madame Alexander Madeline doll, hard plastic, vinyl head, sleep eyes, real lashes, open/close mouth, molded tongue, jointed, blue organdy dress, 1950s, 18 inches, $310.
Schneider glass vase, egg shape, inverted rim, mottled orange, large red flower heads, signed, circa 1925, 9 3/4 inches, $965.
White linen and lace banquet cloth, scalloped lace border, two bands of cutwork embroidery, inner band with fruit baskets, outer with putti, circa 1900, 204 x 67 inches, $1,265.
Phonola Type 547 desk-top intercom, brown Bakelite, output values, dial lamp, push-button, circa 1939, $3,150.
Staffordshire creamware teapot, globe shape, black transfer portrait of Queen Charlotte on one side, crown, symbols and title on other, possibly Wedgwood, circa 1763, 4 3/4 inches, $5,925.
This costume jewelry pin that looks like a bouquet of violets was made by Mazer. The flowers are white metal covered with purple and green enamel. The 3-inch pin sold for $58 at a Morphy Auction in Denver, Pa.
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) – American Indian tribes should be given the first opportunity to reclaim thousands of ancient Southwest artifacts being seized by the government in its sweeping prosecution of theft and trafficking, the federal appointee in charge of Indian affairs told The Associated Press on Friday.
Tribal leaders will have something to say to the government on this issue, said Larry Echo Hawk, assistant Interior secretary for Indian Affairs.
“The tribes should get first priority,” said. “Native people in their hearts are going to feel a connection.”
Echo Hawk, a law professor on leave from Utah’s Brigham Young University, praised his former student – U.S. Attorney Brett Tolman – for taking a tough stance on looting across tribal and federal lands after decades of government indifference.
The number of defendants in the case has grown to 26 in Utah, New Mexico and Colorado. More indictments are expected out of Arizona.
With the first sentencing Thursday of a major defendant, the government became owner of more than 800 artifacts confiscated from a Blanding, Utah, family. Another five moving vans worth of artifacts have been surrendered by a Colorado antiquities dealer.
Echo Hawk acknowledged repatriating artifacts under federal laws will be arduous. It isn’t always clear which modern tribe can claim ownership of an ancient relic. Sacred and burial objects are supposed to go back to their rightful culture, while the government can keep other artifacts stolen from public lands.
Echo Hawk said he didn’t want to see a wholesale transfer of artifacts squirreled away in public museums. Emily Palus, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s national curator in Washington, D.C., has said it could take years to sort through and properly dispose of the relics.
They range from infant cradle boards to turquoise necklaces, pottery and even human remains – adult molars and infant teeth.
Investigators shared photographs of the seized items with the director of the bureaus of Indian Affairs and Indian Education.
“I looked at those things and didn’t want to see them,” Echo Hawk said. “Many of them would be sacred, part of a burial, private – I didn’t want to look at them. People were trading them, making profits from them, like commodities in the marketplace.”
Echo Hawk, 61, a member of the Great Plains’ Pawnee tribe, took over an agency in May that was marked by a lack of leadership during the Bush administration. It changed directors six times in eight years, with the post left vacant for two of those years.
“The tribes have enormous expectations with the Obama administration,” said Echo Hawk, who has been traveling widely to get a firsthand assessment of problems in Indian Country – the agency is a trustee for 66 million acres of land. “They’re expecting us to deliver.”
The post is tough under the best of circumstances. Echo Hawk, of Orem, Utah – he keeps an apartment in Arlington, Va. – said he was dealing with issues like competing licenses for gaming that often pit tribe against another.
For the past dozen years, the Bureau of Indian Affairs has been embroiled in a lawsuit over Indian trust land. The long-running suit claims the Indians were swindled out of billions of dollars in oil, gas, grazing, timber and other royalties overseen by the Interior Department since 1887.
Echo Hawk was in Salt Lake City on Friday to deliver a keynote speech for the 57th annual Utah State History Conference.
He delivered a characteristically moving speech that covered the sweep of U.S.-Indian relations. Echo Hawk, who carries a heavy burden of injustice, emphasized atrocities committed against American Indians in early U.S. history. By the end he was fighting tears, and he received a standing ovation from the crowd at Salt Lake City’s library.
For a second time in weeks at a Utah conference, Echo Hawk detailed his own difficult decision to accept the job and become a “face” for a federal government with a sordid history of mistreating Indians. He finally reconciled his hesitation by vowing to be an “agent for change” instead of a mere caretaker.
For Echo Hawk, the challenge is trying to solve two centuries of tragedy and injustice in the 39 months he’ll have as an appointee in Obama’s first term in office.
“How do you eat an elephant? You eat it one bite at a time,” Echo Hawk said. “How do you reverse 200 years of struggles? It’s not going to be easy.”
Copyright 2009 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
John Charles Gilkey is an obsessed, unrepentant book thief who has stolen hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of rare books. Image courtesy Putnam/Riverhead, Penguin Group (USA).
Over a period of about 10 years, beginning in the late 1990s, book collectorJohn Gilkey of Modesto, Calif., acquired an impressive array of rare first editions by authors including Mark Twain, Beatrix Potter and Vladimir Nabokov. Money was no object because Gilkey didn’t buy his books. He stole them.
As veteran journalist Allison Hoover Bartlett relates in her skillfully composed true-crime debut, The Man Who Loved Books Too Much, Gilkey used worthless checks and stolen credit card numbers to defraud dealers, large and small, out of more than $100,000 worth of coveted volumes. A master of self-justification as well as self-enrichment, Gilkey maintained that it was “unfair” for dealers to charge more than he could afford for the books he desired. Theft, he reasoned, was simply an equitable means of redistributing the wealth.
During his crime spree, Gilkey attracted the attention of Ken Sanders, owner of a Salt Lake City bookstore and security chairman for the Antiquarian Booksellers’ Association of America. Tracking Gilkey across the country, Sanders devised a cunning trap to snare the book thief, successfully putting him in prison – albeit only for a short time.
Bartlett’s eminently readable account of the cat-and-mouse game played by Sanders and Gilkey is notable not only for its fluid presentation but also for the depth of the research upon which it draws. Bartlett conducted extensive interviews with the book thief and his pursuer, gaining the confidence of both men, who shared their stories with an oftentimes surprising candor.
The initial contacts between Bartlett and Gilkey, which occurred while the latter was incarcerated at the Deuel Vocational Institution, 65 miles north of San Francisco, introduce an unexpected note of levity into the narrative. Unfamiliar with the prison’s rules forbidding metal objects, the intrepid reporter has to dash out to her car to remove her underwire bra. Her sense of culture shock only grows once she gets a look at life “on the inside.”
With a keen eye for detail and a measured sense of pacing, Bartlett offers an insightful look at the psychology of the most eccentric of criminals in this swift, entertaining volume about what happens when a love of books takes a sinister turn.
Copyright 2009 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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