Find of the Week -- Wedell & Boers Carpenter's Case!

I took time out from painting and prepping to go to a family run estate sale that was on the way to the antique mall.  The sale was in a 100+ year old farmhouse on almost a hundred acres.  There wasn't much in the house that I wanted, so I went out to a little block building (about the size of a big garage) in the back.  It was the milking parlor and was full of old farm implements and tools I couldn't identify or begin to guess the purpose of.  I got an interesting heavy cast iron bowl that was the water bowl for the cow being milked (the elderly son of the even more elderly farmer told me this).

My greatest treasure, though, is this really shabby suitcase!  It's cloth over wood and has a drop-down side with a removeable tray.  It's really beat up and in poor condition, but so interesting.  It turns out that it's a carpenter's tool case made by Wedell & Boers in Detroit, probably sometime in the late 1910s or 1920s.  I'm going to vacuum it out, figure out how to clean it up without ruining it and get it into some kind of shape.

It's a fun bit of history, even though it will never be in great condition.  Do any of you know what these slats were for?  The leather belts snap over them to hold the contents in -- I'm guessing that they were for the carpenter's rulers, guages or metal files.

What Do You Think This Was?

I picked up this very interesting table at the local thrift -- I paid more than a 'thrift' price, because I loved the styling and thought buyers in my booth might, too.

It's all brass (I think) with a wood inset top -- even the legs and shelf on the bottom are brass.  It has casters and they're little metal ones like they used years ago.

The detail on the drawer is lovely.  The drawer is wood and faced with a brass sheet that's been folded around it and nailed in place.

The top is inlaid and looks like oak to me -- it's joined wood, not veneer.

I could see this as a bedside table in the hospital sets of Downton Abbey, or as a bank or cashier's table in The Sting.  It really looks like 1910s to 1930s to me, and the quality speaks to that era, too.  It could be newer, just made to look old, though.

What do you think?  When do you think it was made and what do you think it was used for?  I'd love it if one of you could identify its era and use!

I Found a Heart's Desire!

I went to a sale last week and had VERY low expectations:  it was advertised as a selling point that the items were 80-90% new and never used by the owner (not a big draw for the lover of all things vintage).  It was less than 3 miles from my house, though, so I couldn't pass up the opportunity. 

I bought a great 50s starburst tidbit tray that was out in the garage on a shelf (totally unappreciated) and a little Made in Japan Enesco lamb figurine. Even the linens were new and in packages!  Then I went upstairs and saw this:

I was SO excited!  I immediately grabbed the price sticker and found the upstairs worker to mark it 'SOLD'!  I've wanted a metal headboard & footboard ever since the days when my husband and I were first married and would go to stay at his family cottage on Buckeye Lake in Ohio (outside of Newark).  The room we got had this marvelous wood-look metal bed with open mesh panels -- I always hoped he'd inherit it if the furniture was ever divided up.  I never said a word, though, since I was just the daughter-in-law and new to the family and assumed that one of his sisters would surely want it.  It ended up being scrapped because I'd never spoken up and no one claimed it (I learned my lesson...)

I've been looking for one ever since, and here was one at this 'mostly new' sale!  Check out the wonderful flower decals -- they're in almost perfect condition!  I think it's from the 1920s or 1930s.  I'll have to do some research to try to date it, bur it doesn't matter in the least. 

It's all set up now and waiting for Christmas houseguests.  I topped it with a yellow chenille bedspread my sister gave me as a gift years ago and added a quilt I'd gotten at an estate sale.

The marble topped table next to it belonged to my grandmother and the star-patterned lamp (with the hideous shade) is from the 50s.  It was always on an end table in our living room when I was growing up.  I still really love it (it needs a new shade, though, don't you think?)

Pay no attention to the way the rest of the room looks -- it's first on our re-do list for January!