[stevehertz]

Well, having decided to make it look presentable you now have two choices, either restore the bare bakelite by polishing it (lots of previous threads on this), or go a stage further and apply a wood finish effect on to it.

The latter can be done using paint and old fashioned faux woodgrain techniques of which there's lots of information on the internet and also suitable paints available for the technique/style. Alternatively, easier but obviously no so nice in the final analysis, apply wood grain effect, self adhesive plastic sheeting. if you use the plastic sheeting, you could 'touch in' just the edges of the end pieces using brown paint.