Meat Serving Cart, ca. 1930
Appraised Value:
$6,000 - $8,000
IMAGE: 1 of 2
Appraisal Video: (2:36)
Appraised By:
Eric Silver
Metalwork & Sculpture
Director
Lillian Nassau, LLC
Appraisal Transcript:
GUEST: This is a stainless-steel prime rib table service cart, and I purchased it about a couple years ago from the... John Ascuaga's warehouse auction, which was mainly just surplus equipment.
APPRAISER: Tell us about Mr. Ascuaga.
GUEST: John Ascuaga came to town in the early '50s and started with a restaurant with maybe a couple slot machines-- I'm not sure-- and now is still alive and still managing his own business. He's the last of the original '50s-era casino operators that still is alive and operating his own casino. And he was at the auction, and he's quite a hands-on person. I talked to the warehouse personnel. They said he comes out there a couple times a week. He gave me a little history on this cart. If you want to open it... It has Sterno heat in it, and it keeps your prime rib sizzling, and they served the prime ribs at the table. And this is a cart that he originally used when he first opened up in Sparks in the early '50s, and then he used it continually as he started getting into the casino business and adding hotels and towers, et cetera. He used it up through, I believe he said, the '80s-- around 30 or 35 years. And it'd been in his warehouse for the last, you know, 20 years or so.
APPRAISER: Well, it's interesting because it probably wasn't new when he bought it. It's actually a piece that's from the 1930s. And it exhibits this great 1930s streamline design, this modern design. And what I think was so incredible about it is that it actually looks like a zeppelin the way it has these lines on it, the way it comes together at the front. And I think what really gives it that modern look are these wheel covers on the bottom. We really don't know where these were made. There's some debate about whether or not they were made in Europe or whether they were made in the United States, but they do show up. They show up in different materials. They show up in aluminum, sometimes they're painted, sometimes they have vinyl on them. This seems to be a really unusual one in the metal, and the form is just wonderful. And there's a real great craze now for this streamline modern design. What did you pay for it a few years back?
GUEST: Around $600.
APPRAISER: Well, I think you did very well. Now a piece like this at auction would probably bring between $6,000 and $8,000.
GUEST: Yeah, I have... It draws... It drew a lot of attention on the way in here.
APPRAISER: It certainly did. The value I'm putting on it is based on it as a design object. I'm just going on the basis of just a wonderful, wonderful example of '30s design.
GUEST: Well, someday I'll leave it to a local museum or...
APPRAISER: Right, right.
GUEST: And keep it here in northern Nevada.
APPRAISER: Great-- thanks for coming in.
GUEST: Okay, thank you.
