GUEST: This belonged to my great-uncle. He was a physician by training here in New Jersey, and to get him through medical school, he would drive for wealthy families in Rhode Island. He would take them antiquing, and developed an eye for antiques. During the course of his professional life, he was a, an avid collector of paperweights and other fine arts. And one day, helping him clean out his garage, we came across this, it was wrapped in plastic in a bag. And I asked my uncle, "What is this?", and, "It's very interesting." And he's, like, "You can have it." We never went into detail about the piece. I have had it in my possession for about 30 years. I have looked online for stuff like this. In my opinion, it doesn't fall in the category of memorabilia. It feels different, it's quite heavy.
APPRAISER: Yeah.
GUEST: I could almost do curls.
APPRAISER: (laughs)
GUEST: It's different to me. It doesn't look like a lot of the mass-produced... It doesn't look commercial.
APPRAISER: It has a very elegant and refined presence. I talked to other appraisers, and we all thought that it was made in a foundry, for starters.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: There's no marks on it where it was put on an anvil and did any hand work with it with a hammer or anything like that. Have you ever heard the term "end of day"?
GUEST: No.
APPRAISER: Well, "end of day" was used in a lot of manufacturing places-- glass, porcelain, foundries-- when they wouldn't be on the company time, and they would make things for their own amusement.
GUEST: Ah.
APPRAISER: That's one possibility.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: The other possibility is, because there's a mortise joint here created by a slot, I wondered if it might have had some other piece that went under it, but that might just have been the way they terminated it, also. With the idea that it might be mounted as a piece of sculpture. It's a really wonderful piece of folk art. I would say that it is a cast-iron bust of a Black man, circa 1900. And I think it's American.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: If it's an end-of-day piece, then it could have been made as a whimsy by anyone.
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: This is somebody that had skills, because they've had to make some kind of a model in order to create the mold, which opens the door that they possibly made more than one.
GUEST: Right.
APPRAISER: His hair is painted black in the back. Can you see traces of that paint?
GUEST: I, yes, yes.
APPRAISER: And there's traces of red where his lips are, and you can see a little bit of traces of paint where his eyes are.
GUEST: Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER: Some people would look at this, and think this is a racially stereotypical depiction of a Black man. What are your feelings about that?
GUEST: I don't see that at all. You mentioned earlier the lips looked a little red. They look red. It could be rust, as well. I have thought and processed a lot of that, as well. When I look at this, I see a dignified Black man with a wide nose. We have wide noses. I see full lips. We have full lips. I see a dignified person. I don't see anything negative from it.
APPRAISER: So what made you pick that out of your uncle's house?
GUEST: I just feel something from it. It, it emanates some energy to me. It just resonates with me.
APPRAISER: Conservatively, out there in the market, it probably would be in the $1,000 to $1,500 range.
GUEST: Okay. That's awesome.
