We solved one mystery this week only to have another present itself nearly immediately. One of my colleagues is working with some new additions to the already extensive Autry Family collection (note that this is another of the families from the Gargoyle map) and he turned up a pair of puzzling objects:
They’re tubes, obviously, silver and quite tiny, no more than a couple of inches long. You can see the slide that runs in a groove along the back. Only one has the chain attached but the other one does have the little eyelet where the chain should go. On the front of both is the “I” that was used to signify the “Institute”:
So they look like very small lipstick tubes, right? But if that’s what they are then what is the chain for? What could you possibly clip them to? Can someone explain this to me? All guesses will be accepted gratefully.
Bonus: The tops are engraved with initials.
This one must have belonged to Allie May Autry ’25 who we talked about in this post about the Scanlan Building.
