I’m pretty sure all you collectors know Wes Cowan from 13 years appraising on Antiques Roadshow and six years as a History Detective. Many of you might also know that he was raised in a household filled with Victorian antiques by a mother who liked all things “old” and that he turned his love of “old” into degrees in anthropology and archaeology; eventually teaching and then becoming Curator of Archaeology at the Cincinnati Museum of Natural History. But what you might not know is that Cowan has always been a collector.

As a child Cowan collected fossils, arrowheads, and china plates; as a young man in college, he collected antique photographs. In fact, if it weren’t for a passion for collecting he might never have become “Wes Cowan, Auctioneer,” let alone a regular on those TV shows. After 15 years of collecting photographs, Cowan had amassed what was, at the time, the best collection of Frank J. Haynes photographs & stereoviews — which he (somewhat painfully) sold to start his business.

When we met Cowan briefly before his Thursday night lecture, part of the Plains Art Museum’s Trash or Treasure event, it was really clear that his passion for collecting isn’t just some front to appease collectors or fans of the shows. Within the first few minutes the talk turned quickly to collecting. Not just asking us what we collect, but making an off-hand comment that he’s been kicking himself for not starting a collection of hotel door key cards earlier. It’s just the sort of comment you’d expect a traveling collector to make.

Once he began his talk, Cowan focused on the appeal of History Detectives. He said that the show “taps into our inherent interests in the history of our country and the history of our families.” His enthusiasm for collecting and understanding of collectors was clear as he talked about how objects hold stories and how collectors should think of themselves as curators. (In my notes I wrote, “It’s like Wes reads my columns!”)

When discussing History Detectives, Cowan winced and ducked from imaginary tossed tomatoes as he told us that none of the stars of the show do the research. He explained that they may suggest objects and stories they run across but it’s the producers who select the objects & then assign them to the show’s researchers. Working in pairs, researchers have six weeks to do the research. From this research, a loose script or story lay-out is created, allowing the History Detective to provide off-the-cuff narration — including the inclusion of new or changing information as it comes in. Each History Detective then has three days to be filmed telling the story, with two days of travel. (With so much travel, it’s no wonder Cowan laments not starting that hotel door key collection earlier.)

Cowan feels honored to be a part of the show, saying, “It’s a privilege to be invited into homes & stories and to go & do what others can’t.” Watching him say it, there’s no doubt of the sincerity of his words.

Antiques Roadshow production has far more of a family atmosphere among the appraisers; not just because he’s been a part of the show for twice as long but because he and the other 75 appraisers work together at each show. And boy do the appraisers work at each show. Even if each city Roadshow visits airs as multiple episodes, it all was taped in one day. That means 75 appraisers work with 7,500 people — each one bringing multiple items — all in one day. None of the appraisers are compensated in any way for participating in Roadshow — flights, food, hotel etc. is all paid for out of each appraiser’s pocket. Each appraiser does it for the fun and exposure. Or I should say for the potential exposure. For while there are 12 million viewers, there is no guarantee that any appraiser will have a taped segment. As appraisers run into great stories, they have to make a pitch about being filmed to producers. If they make a strong enough case, they may get air time; if not, they’ve paid for the trip, done an exhausting day’s work, all for naught.

Well, almost naught…

Appraisers are allowed to set their cards and literature on tables. However, they are absolutely forbidden to solicit business. This includes verbally giving out their contact information. Cowan tells the story of a lady who asked how to contact him. He replied that he couldn’t say, but mentioned where his card could be found. When she stated she was unable to read the print on his card, Cowan told the woman she would need to get her granddaughter to read the card because he was forbidden to read it to her. That’s pretty strict; but just goes to show you how ethical Roadshow is.

As for his “day job” as auctioneer, Cowan says the business has changed a lot. “Farm auctions are no longer lucrative,” he said, and, “Sotheby’s & Christie’s have proven that auctioneering is all about marketing.” And he addressed the impact of the Internet too.

Within 5-7 years, eBay and the like have quickly shown that “rare” is indeed a relative term based on dealer opinion &/or experience. Once “rarely seen” things were shown for the readily available stuff they were, and the prices for low-to-middle end antiques & collectibles dropped drastically. However, the accessibility of the Internet has assisted those searching for scarce items, likely bringing stronger auction sales for high end antiques and art. He also said the accessibility was a good thing, allowing people to find objects, connect with other collectors & collecting groups, as well as research more easily.

On Friday, before the VIP Trash or Treasure dinner, we had yet another opportunity to talk privately with both Wes Cowan and his colleague, Danica M. Farnand, a specialist in American Indian Art. We have lots more to share from those conversations, but for now we’ll leave you with the one question that every collector & watcher of History Detectives wants to know: What are their favorite resources for research?

Farnand first mentioned Google, then added that she most often uses the Burke Museum database, as well as the Smithsonian database, AskArt.com, and Peabody’s database (but added that it was a bit difficult to use). Cowan added ArtFact.com, Prices4Antiques, Ancestry.com, ABE.com, CivilWarData.com, and The Library of Congress’ American Memory Historical Collection to the list. He also said that more and more universities and museums are adding their archives online, so the resources would only be growing.

Skeptical that they were hiding something, like secret databases and clandestine meetings in private libraries off limits to the average collector, we pressed a bit. “On History Detectives you have a lot of access to archives and libraries of organizations… Do average collectors have such access?”

“In my experiences, as a collector, researcher and auctioneer, I’ve found archivists & librarians are always anxious to help,” he said.

“Even if you’re not a History Detective?” we asked.

“It’s not like a librarian’s ever going to tell a researcher to go away,” he added, laughing. Then he leaned in, grinned and conspiratorily added, “But being a History Detective doesn’t hurt!”

A few weeks ago I was the lucky bidder on a vintage cook book. I must admit, my interest in the book was not so much ‘culinary’ as it was the historical proof that there is nothing ‘new’ in the latest Hollywood glamour cook books, like The Black Book of Hollywood Diet Secrets by Kym Douglas & Cindy Pearlman; but this is not the main tale of this collecting adventure.

Like most collectors, I was lured to this particular copy for its conditions (clean pages, sound binding, etc. & it included a most rare dust jacket) as well as some particularly unique pieces of ephemera.

Included with the copy of the Hollywood Glamour Cook Book by Mariposa was a copy of a newspaper clipping of the author, several copies of the sender’s postal money orders, a postcard in the author’s handwriting (with her signature), and a postal envelope, also in the author’s handwriting.

It was my hope, not simply as a collector but as a researcher, that the ephemera would prove useful (as well as valuable) in searching for information on the author as there is little information on her.

I knew there was little information on Mariposa before I bid. I had accidentally discovered knowledge of her and this book in doing other research and was intrigued by the title and the one-name author that I stopped the first search to work on Mariposa.

I kept watching for affordable copies (in many online stores it is listed over $50, plus shipping; this was $30 with shipping, plus the extras mentioned) until I found, and won, this one.

While waiting for the book to arrive, I continued to research but found little and, frustrated by hitting ‘a wall’, I waited for the book to arrive, hoping it & the ephemera would provide additional, helpful, clues.

The book itself offered little information. The “I Am” was a beguiling bit, but with little information:

Your “Mystic Pot,” with Herbs and Spice,
I charm your meals and make them nice.
I make your cake and pastry good
With secret hints from Hollywood.

First I learned Mariposa’s name from the return address and signature: Mariposa Hayes. Putting that into search engines, I learned that Mariposa was a pseudonym, and that Mariposa Hayes had renewed the copyright to this book in 1967. And I discovered that a Mariposa Hayes was a performer in Spring 3100 in 1928. This made sense with the jacket’s front flap information regarding, “Who is Mariposa?” which mentioned her “living part of the modern theatre.” And 1928 would make sense with the 1940 copyright date too.

Plus, there is the book’s lovely black and white photo of Mariposa, credited to Murray Korman, a rather popular New York commercial photographer who took portraits of a number of theatre and silent film actors. Korman was even well-known enough to be quoted in Time (March 22, 1937) — for something darn near unforgivable in my book:

“Look at Katharine Hepburn,” said Photographer Korman, “there was a girl with no looks but a college education and hasn’t she made a success of herself?”

See how easy it is to get derailed in research? Everything is so fascinating!

But back to Mariposa.

There was also scant, teasing information of a Mariposa Hayes in the 1930 New York Social Blue Book, living with, it appears, a Mrs. C. Coleman and a Mr. Nelson Taylor Hayes. Further research on those names yielded nothing on Mariposa; however, Mr. Nelson Taylor Hayes may have been the 1941 author of the novel Bahama Passage, which went on to become a film with Dorothy Dandridge, among others.

I turned next to the copy of the newspaper clipping. There was no date, no publication, but the photo’s caption reads:

Mariposa, author of “Hollywood Glamor Cook Book,” points out a few choice recipes in her book to John H. Hayes. She tells him that glamor is not confined to the feminine contingent but young men can take a page from her book and improve their complexions and looks.

John H. Hayes? Was that a relative? (And if so, how tacky to pass-off him off as other than a relative!) It is difficult to tell from the poor photocopy of what I gather was a black and white newspaper clipping how old Mariposa was, but Mr. Hayes is sort of lumped into the category of “young men” here… So the still beautiful, but possibly of the ‘well preserved’ variety, Mariposa was photographed with her son?

A quick search shows John Hayes to be a rather common name, and, if you can trust Wikipedia, there are a number of relatively famous ones… Including in film, a B-Movie maker born in 1930.

If John was her son, that could account for Mariposa’s short lived theatre career. But so can a million things, including lack of talent.

So far, there was little to go on — lots of fascinating detour possibilities, but not much on Mariposa.

Who was Mariposa?

I looked at the title page. Normally researching book publishers offers little, but I was desperate here… Published by Glamour Publications, 1265 S. W. 11th St., Miami, Florida. That sounded familiar — too familiar. I looked back at the addresses on the ephemera; yup, that was Mariposa’s home address. So it looks like the book was self published by the entrepreneurial Mariposa.

But searches for the publisher name only returned other copies of the book, each with less information than I had already forced from the Internet. M. Barrows & Company, Inc, the “trade distributors” offered nothing either.

I stopped to recap: She was an actress in 1928, she lived in Miami and had written and published a book in 1940. That’s it. No information on marriage or family.

Most folks I know would have quit by now; even the obsessive ones. But not me. I thumbed through the book again. The contents were recipes, more clever, cutesy poetry, and the foreward was just a general sales pitch for the contents.

I looked at the dust jacket again. Ah, another book for sale on the back inside flap… Eat to Grow Young, by H. A. Hayes, N.D. Another Hayes! And wasn’t that familiar sounding too? I flipped to the front of the book, to the dedication:

To Dr. Henri A. Hayes

To “Doc” who is a connoisseur
Of Crepes Suzette and Petit Beurre,
Who helped inspire many treats
Found in this book of health recipes.

Along with the corny (and ill-rhyming) poem was more than probably the H.A. Hayes from the other book. (N.D, is, after all, a naturopathic doctor — but a “Doc” nevertheless!)

A quick search later and I found a Dr. H. A. Hayes, but it just didn’t seem to fit. While I didn’t know the age of this 1940 Dr. Hayes, the tiny bit of information suggested nothing of naturopathic medicine, let alone Mariposa. But I continued to search…

And then, in searching for H. A. Hayes and Eat to Grow Young, I discovered another clue — a clue that had me ‘hoot’ at the monitor and forced hubby to turn away from his computer and ask me if I was OK.

In the copyright renewals for 1961, I saw that Eat to Grow Young’s copyright was renewed by Mariposa, whose Glamour Publications had published it (as seen on the jacket flap). But the exciting part was that Dr. Henri Hayes was also a pseudonym — “SEE Hayes, Henrietta A.” And right below that, the listing for Hayes, Henrietta A. was the fact that Mariposa Hayes had renewed the copyright.

Another relative? Her mother?

I don’t know. I found no additional information on Henrietta. You’d think a female naturopathic doctorate who authored a book in 1934 would be easy to find; but sadly, no.

Then again, you’d think a glamorous woman known only by her first name, who peddled self-published beauty books would also have some sort of legacy.

I may have hit a wall for now, but I have not given up. Mariposa’s words on the postcard, checking on the safety of the book mailed in 1983, ring true for me:

The book is so precious, it should have been insured. I was very reluctant to part with it because as a collectors item too it is very valuable, but you wrote so nicely, so let me know!!!! I’ll be worrying, Mariposa Hayes

Mr. M Kopal, the recipient of this rare book, lovingly kept the book safe with all the ephemera for 25 years, only to have his family/estate rid themselves of it. Now I have it, and like most things I collect, the hunt for more information continues. Like a dog with a bone. Not that beautiful Mariposa should be compared thus; only my obsessive dedication to research.

If you have any information, please, share it!