I guess I didn’t do good job of sleuthing before my last post, because the firescreen mystery has already been solved thanks to a few reader tips and Google. Here’s one in the background of a photo of a Ginger Wyatt vase from eBay (from Pinterest):

Interesting coincidence, but it doesn’t prove that Ginger Wyatt made the firescreen, and the eBay auction this came from is long gone.

But guess what turns up with a search for “Kummerow fire screen”?

From the Pinterest description:

Lew and Barbara Kummerow – “stained glass” firescreen, prairie/craftsman style in colors of green, pink, yellow and white. metal frame. sold on ebay for $91.13.

This one isn’t mine — I can tell because it has a pink panel on the right, and on mine that panel was in the center (also it was orange, not pink). The legs are also a different style. It’s possible the one from the first photo is the one I ended up acquiring, but now that I know there were several of these floating around, I suspect not.

Still, I destroyed a Lew and Barbara Kummerow firescreen that could have sold for ninety-one dollars. (ARGGGHHH!!)

On the bright side, I’m confident I didn’t pay more than a few dollars for it. Whoever sold it to me must not have known its origins either. If I had known what it was, I would have kept it intact and used it in one of my 1:12 Guys from Texas roomboxes instead.

Now that I know it was an artisan piece (before I destroyed it), I want to figure out a better paint to use than the Gallery Glass, so I can try to touch up those bare spots. Even though the panels are glued in now, I think I could carefully reach into the house to do it.

Just now I was clicking through old Ron Rhodes auctions on Live Auctioneers, because why not, and I came across this familiar-looking firescreen…

If you read my post about creating a stained glass cabinet for the Craftsman bungalow vignette, it’ll look familiar to you too!

The title of this lot was Kummerow & Wyatt Dollhouse Lighting Miniatures and I immediately thought, “Shit, did I destroy a piece of Barbara Kummerow stained glass?!”

Here’s the auction description:

Floor lamp with Tiffany style shade attributed to Barbara Kummerow has a brass, wood and clay pole 5 1/4″H, Ginger Wyatt hand painted porcelain table lamp, adjustable height brass floor lamp, also includes a fireplace screen with tight cracks in enameled area

Okay, so it was grouped with lights made by Barbara Kummerow and Ginger Wyatt (I don’t know who that is) but not necessarily made by one of them. That makes me feel better.

My next thought was, “Wait, is this MY firescreen?!” (Which is now a cabinet.)

I can’t remember where I got the firescreen, but this auction happened in December 2021 and I’ve had it longer than that. Just in case I was wrong about that and time has lost all meaning, I checked the date on some pictures I took of the firescreen when I started working on the bungalow and they are dated 2020.

So unless my future self has perfected time travel and is now zipping around planting miniature items in my workshop just to mess with me, it’s unlikely this is the same firescreen. Then again, my inability to remember where I got it sort of supports that theory.*

This leaves the question of who did make these firescreens…? It seemed like a one-off craft project to me, as opposed to an artisan piece, but I guess not. I hope I didn’t destroy something valuable.

If anyone reading this knows anything about the mysterious firescreen(s), please satisfy my curiosity!

Update July 15, 2022: The mystery has been solved!

*Note to my future self: if you are out there and have in fact perfected time travel, I would love to get my hands on the Jim Marcus Russian Embassy that I missed out on in 2019, and the Carlson Victorian Mansion that I badly wanted to buy off Craigslist back in 2018 but didn’t have space for. I have a much bigger workshop now!