BRAD HORN/Nevada Appeal This Broadwood Baby Grand Piano was manufactured between 1843-1852 and donated to the Robert's House Museum by Mr. and Mrs. Victor McDonald on Nov. 17, 1984. The antique was crafted with rosewood.
It's a beautiful baby grand piano, but it just doesn't fit in the Roberts House Museum, said Carson City Historical Society volunteer Paula Cannon.
It doesn't fit aesthetically or dimensionally. The seven-foot long piano leaves little room for the society's fundraising teas.
"Our teas start in September, and if the piano wasn't there we could sit 20 people easily," Cannon said. "As it is we're doing good with cramming 16 people in that room."
So the historic society is hoping to get some worth out of the piano - by taking a donation for it and moving it out.
"It's listed in our inventory for $15,000, but whoever buys it is making a contribution to the society, and we are a nonprofit organization so that would be tax deductible," Cannon said.
The years have been hard on the rosewood piano.
"It's a beautiful piece, but it doesn't hold a tune because it's about 150 years old," said Carlita Ray, the former owner of the Brougher-Bath Mansion. "As soon as you tune it, it goes out of tune."
The piano was on display for the last year at the mansion, where it complemented a bay area window room in the elegant Carson City historic home. When the mansion sold recently, the piano was moved back to the society's museum on North Carson Street.
"The Roberts House is small and the piano takes up three-fourths of the room it's in," Cannon said. "It's a very elegant piece of furniture, and it's definitely out of place in the Roberts House."
The Roberts were a middle-class family, she said. They probably owned an upright piano, but not a baby grand of this stature.
The donation will benefit the Carriage House building project, which is $350,000 building that the society would like to construct for meeting space.
Not much is known about the piano. Cannon believes it was donated to the society on Nov. 17, 1984. It is a John Broadwood piano believed to have been constructed in Scotland in 1853.
Appraisers have been consulted on the piano's value.
• Contact reporter Becky Bosshart at bbosshart@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1212.