By By JOHN EBY / Dowagiac Daily News
NILES – Not even the 129 members from 19 states and England who attended August's 22nd annual national Antique Stove Association convention in Dowagiac could give Elsie West closure.
She hoped that the mysterious casting of a Native American head in profile, measuring about 10 inches by 12 inches, that she possessed for the past 46 years could finally be solved.
While no one could explain its origins, one collector of Indian items from the Southwest offered her $1,000 on the spot, which she declined.
"My son described it to my granddaughter as 'like Santa Claus at the mall.' He said everybody herded up there to look at that Indian and were just flabbergasted by it."
"I'm not pushing for" selling it," West said. "It feels good to have something nobody else has got. If that sounds catty, I can't help it."
"Nobody seems to know anything about it," she said Tuesday afternoon.
Not even a credible theory.
"They couldn't even give me an appraisal out there (at the Conservation Club on M-51 North) because none of them had ever seen anything like it."
It has no markings on either the front or back to connect it to the hometown of P.D. Beckwith's Round Oak stove factory, except that's where her uncle found it in 1960 while helping remove one of its old buildings.
The back is hollowed out, with two threaded holes that suggest bolts for mounting.
So though it was found in a Round Oak building, it could be "Doe-Wah-Jack" or it could be from some other source. Likewise, no one knows what was the head's intended purpose, although "when my uncle brought it home, he told me he thought it was the mold they used to make the emblem on stove doors, but another guy thought it was an advertising item that went on the wall, so I honestly don't know.
"He said he found it. I don't know if he found it on a wall and took it down or if he found it under debris on the floor. I don't know if they actually tore it down or just cleaned it out. I know it was '60 because he moved in in September and stayed with me until December 1962. I know it was in that time frame. I lived on Front Street until just a year ago."
"My uncle was living with me and he didn't have much money, so he asked me if I'd take that as partial payment for staying with me. I love Indians. My bedroom is all Indians. I'm a descendant of the Putnam family who settled Cass County," West said.
"I haven't tried to clean it," she said. "They told me out there at that show they were glad I hadn't because it's still got some of the natural patina. It will not stick to a magnet. We think it was fastened to something, and if I keep it, it's going to be. My son's going to have a board made of the map of Michigan and he's going to have this mounted on it."
West moved to Niles to be closer for babysitting her great-granddaughter.
She is a retired cook. "I cooked at the Elks Club for six years. Originally I started out at Olympia. I also had Silver Creek Restaurant for three years in the late '70s" when the bowling alley was where Rite-Aid is today.