Large Plaque.... any idea who it is?

[paulb104]

So I inherited this plaque. It's about two feet wide. It's really really heavy. I was told what it was, which was wrong, but I'll withhold that for the moment as not to pollute thought.


I should mention that the weird spots on the face of the plaque are from the egg crate foam box that it was sitting in since the mid-1970's.

Anyone have any ideas?

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

Upgraded Night Vision Monocular Digital Infrared Monocular Telescope for 100% Darkness with 8X Zoom - Grab it through Amazon!

[paulb104]

Just because I can, I emailed Bill Nye about the plaque. I know it's not him but maybe he'd want it anyway.

Stranger things have happened.

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

Family Maps of Hinds County, Mississippi, Deluxe Edition - Grab it through Amazon!

[Charlie P. (NY)]

You never know. The nose is all wrong for Bill Nye but the rest is pretty close!

 

[paulb104]

Mom taught me it never hurts to ask

 

[Spats]

Charles Lindbergh, or such ?
Someone laying in the grass lost in aviationally deep thoughts ?

View attachment 1411872

I think Plug N Play is on the right track. The image on the right represents what the man on the left is pondering. And the image on the right appears to be that same man as a barefoot boy watching a bird soar and saying to himself "I'm gonna fly like that some day and I sure hope that bird doesn't crap on my face". If you want to get all symbolic, the water between him and land on the other side is the Atlantic. There appears to be flat land in front of the mountain across the water. So the land and mountains is France or Europe in general.

Even if the Lindbergh theory seems a little far fetched, this has to be in honor an aviator. You say you inherited it. Were there any pilots in your family?

 

[nhbenz]

Well, I'll throw this out there despite its lunacy... if you enlarge the H 70 mark to the point where it takes up your whole screen, does anyone else see what looks like small initials to the left of the mark? C.W.P.? - I can always be wrong.

 

[paulb104]

Even if the Lindbergh theory seems a little far fetched, this has to be in honor an aviator. You say you inherited it.

Yes, it was inherited, from an antiques collector. My wife's dad, a die hard New Yorker who bought the plaque from a guy in 1972 from a guy in North Dakota. We know that he was in North Dakota for a coin show.

 

[paulb104]

Well, I'll throw this out there despite its lunacy... if you enlarge the H 70 mark to the point where it takes up your whole screen, does anyone else see what looks like small initials to the left of the mark? C.W.P.? - I can always be wrong.

Now if it were me, on my windows computer I'd zoom in like you said, take a screenshot, circle those initials, then share it.

In the meantime, I picked up the monstrosity of a plaque and took some more pics.

Here's one taken with my regular phone camera lens


And here are three pics with a macro lens that I put on my phone. I love my macro lens. Everyone should have one. We actually got ours as a freebie gift, but it similar in style to this one.

 

[Plug N Play]

LOL ...

When I zoom it up to the point that my eyes cross and I tilt my head from side to side and tap the top of my head I start to see all sorts of things.



Abe Lincoln slapping his forehead in either 1935 or 1235.
That gives us a time frame to work with-in ... LOL

 

[paulb104]

I think that's the equivalent of picture taken of Mars by NASA's Viking 1 orbiter in 1976...



Our eyes see patterns in random things and our brains perceive them as "things"

 

[nhbenz]

Indeed, I think I was wrong. It was most visible in the original picture of the mark, so with it virtually disappearing in the good close-ups I'm sure it's nothing. Oh well...
I appreciate you're efforts in entertaining my hair-brained theory.

 

[trikikiwi]

Now if it were me, on my windows computer I'd zoom in like you said, take a screenshot, circle those initials, then share it.

In the meantime, I picked up the monstrosity of a plaque and took some more pics.

Here's one taken with my regular phone camera lens
View attachment 1413092

And here are three pics with a macro lens that I put on my phone. I love my macro lens. Everyone should have one. We actually got ours as a freebie gift, but it similar in style to this one.
View attachment 1413095
View attachment 1413096
View attachment 1413097

Instead of H70, I'm seeing H, upside down and mirror imaged 2, and O
Not surprisingly, I've had no luck researching that idea.

 

[paulb104]

I appreciate you're efforts in entertaining my hair-brained theory.

Hey, that's why we're here!

 

[Ekim14]

Looks like a bronze memorial bulled off someones grave.

 

[paulb104]

I finally dug through all my old email. It was Reeve Lindbergh who had this to say:

I'm not an expert in the multitudes of Lindbergh art works of the time following the flight to Paris, but I don't actually think this is even meant to be my father, though I could be wrong.

It looks to me as though it's a portrait of some other, very specific aviator, and possibly a memorial piece? Looking at the hairline, the eyebrows, and the mouth, I don't recognize this man, and don't think I know him, though I'd like to---nice face!

The portraits of my father are often stylized, but are immediately recognizable. I'd say the artist was working, if not from life, then from a photograph, and not one of my father.

 

[DCMatt]

First of all, damn you guys for making me look at this again.

I looked at this one for a long time last week. There aren't many clues in it to help us...

One observation is the bow tie. It's hand tied. 1920's or 30's style. By 1970 bow ties were bigger and many were pre-tied with a strap and hook.

So why is "H" compelled to make a bronze plaque - presumably from an old photo - of this guy in 1970? I'm guessing because it's a tribute and this guy is dead.

And why is paulb's father-in-law - a die-hard New Yorker - compelled to buy it 2 years later?

I get the 'aviator' theme mentioned before, but I'm discounting that as "group think" from the early mention of Lindbergh in the thread.

It could just as easily a poet or author or just somebody's idea of heaven.

STILL looking.

DCMatt

 

[paulb104]

DCMatt, thanks for the effort. Don't go crazy. It's just a plaque. An expert once told me to go to a boat salesman and sell it as a boat anchor.

My father-in-law had a knack for spotting things of value and buying them for small amounts. I once watched him buy a glass bottle at a flea market for eight dollars. It was an amber colored thing about eight inches tall with a face of president on each side. About two weeks later I was with him when he sold that same bottle, the eight dollar bottle, for four hundred dollars.

Once we were at a swap meet style show and some guy had a box of five medals, a set, in a fancy velvet lined box. It was like thirty degrees out and he was sitting in his car. The box was marked twenty five, her dad walked over to the car with a twenty dollar bill. The dealer rolled down his window half an inch and took the bill. We took the box of medals back to the car, then went to lunch and drove home. When we got home we examined the medals. The largest one, over six inches across and weighed more than one pound, was marked STERLING on the rim.

I can make my hands tired with stories like this.

Did everything he buy pan out? No. Why did he buy this plaque? Who knows. What I still want to know is, how many coin and token collectors could there have been in 1972 in South Dakota for there to have been a show?

 

[paulb104]

It just occurred to me that I have always presumed that the H70 was H for the artist and 70 for 1970. The 70 could be 1870, or might not even be the date at all.

 

[DCMatt]

DCMatt, thanks for the effort. Don't go crazy.

I've been contributing this forum for 10+ years. You have no idea...

The point remains that he saw value in it. So it likely isn't just some random guy.

I looked at a few more pictures of famous bow ties. The style could easily be from the 40's or 50's as well.

So who was famous enough to be commemorated in bronze around 1970 that wore a bow tie and dreamed about lying in field of grass near the mountains with a bird flying overhead...?

Not going crazy. Just going curious. This is why I come here.

DCMatt

 

[DCMatt]

It just occurred to me that I have always presumed that the H70 was H for the artist and 70 for 1970. The 70 could be 1870, or might not even be the date at all.

Not 1870.

We can say with a high degree of certainty that 70 is a date.

 

[Plug N Play]

I tried Howard Hughes, and Cessna, and whoever else came to mind and came up with a blank