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Cool find. People restore these and turn them into funky coffee tables. It’s a ‘stove board’, used to protect flooring from heat and stray embers from the stove sitting on top of it. The upper surface is tin and ‘Art-Inlay’ boards were inset with mother of pearl. They usually date from the first part of the 1900s.
The company was originally founded in 1884 as the ‘Wabash Novelty Wood Works’ in Wabash, Indiana (South Wabash, Water and Miami streets) by Henry M. Gardner and James Meyers. They produced balusters, counter-tops, brackets, mouldings, toy wagons, sleds and screen doors. They changed name to the ‘Wabash Screen Door Company’ in September 1890, by which time they were also making windows, stove boards and washboards.
They moved to Rhinelander, Wisconsin in 1891 and operated from there until 1901 when the factory was destroyed in a fire, and they then moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota (2222 SE Elm). They also had a plant in Memphis, Tennessee (1217 Florida avenue), and a sales office in Chicago, Illinois (115 Adams Street). The Minneapolis plant closed in the early 1960s and they moved everything to Memphis.
There’s one here on Etsy for what I think is a
completely ridiculous price:
https://www.etsy.com/listing/1012775041/antique-wabash-screen-door-co-stove
Reportedly, they can usually be picked up for between $70-150 unless in excellent condition.
WELCOME to a VERY FINE FORUM
