Porcelain Insulator News
by Jack H. Tod

Reprinted from "INSULATORS - Crown Jewels of the Wire", June 1978, page 25

Emma Almeida (Shrewsbury, Mass.) has reported a nail knob with new markings as shown in the sketch at the right. The following information on it is all from my new book, "Electrical Porcelain".

The DIXIE could be that of Dixie Electrical Manufacturing Co., Birmingham, Alabama, a manufacturer of various types of insulators (no other info on the company). 

The NAIL IT (or NAILIT?) was a registered trademark (#147,509 of 10-18-21) of J. H. Parker & Son, a jobber of electrical equipment in Massachusetts & West Va. This trademark appears on nail knobs made by more than one porcelain company. 

The 1-7-19 patent is #1,290,540 of G. Glocker, North East, Maryland. The 2-3-20 patent is #1,329,656 of A. H. Fargo, Poughkeepsie, N.Y., and this patent was licensed widely to various insulator manufacturers.

Dear Jack: 

We would appreciate any information you could give us on this insulator, which is comparable to The No. 5 cable in glass and only similar to the U-408 in the porcelain Universal Style Chart. 

It is unmarked and has a very pretty tan glaze color. 

One more question, you mentioned in the Sept. 1977 issue of Crown Jewels that there were four known blue Mickey Mouses (U-395). Jerry Turner has one and we have 2. We have been wondering who has the fourth one of these? 

We are quite pleased that we have come up with this insulator. It is an "attention getter" in our display at shows, and we are rather proud of it. So far, we haven't seen any more like it, but would have to assume there are some somewhere. Bob & Phoebe Adams, 
Miami, Florida

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Dear Bob & Phoebe: 

Scott & Betty Given (Ohio) have a blue U-395, so I guess that makes it the fourth one. As far as I know, these all originated with the four that were originally found by Ron LaSalle (New York) some years ago.

The drawing for the U-408 in the Universal Style Chart was made from the fussy artist drawing in the 1908 catalog of The New Lexington High Voltage Porcelain Co., wherein it was labeled the "No. 5 Cable". Most U-408 specimens do approximate closely the U-408 drawing (see photo on page 40 of Feb 1976 CJ), so we never gave it much more thought when the U-408's first started turning up in late 1974. Presumably these were New Lexington items. 

Your specimen is still nominally a "No. 5 Cable" and could be described as Sim U-408. However, it is distinctly different, and I suspect it may be a Locke item. Because of the importance of this early and impressive style, and to possibly assist in identifying the early manufacturers who may have made these, I think it should be added to the Style Chart as U-408A.

Jack

To: John J. Pines, A. B. Chance Co.

Dear John: 

... By the way, it still bugs me about the date written "196?" in my Porcelain Insulators Guide Book for the year in which A. B. Chance sold the P.P., Inc. dry press operation at Carey to Clarken Company (and thereafter operated as Porcelain Products Company). Guess I overworked myself chasing down the very old dates but was insufficiently inspired to dig out such recent dates. If you can learn what correct numeral should be substituted for the question mark in the "196?", please drop me a line some day. 

Jack

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Dear Jack: 

I checked with the former secretary of the A. B. Chance Co. and find that the above plant was sold to Clarken Co. July 1, 1963. This should allow you to erase that question mark from your book. 

John

Dear Jack: 

Enclosed is a sketch of what might be a threadless porcelain insulator. Could you please tell me more about it? The color is a mottled black, brown, gray and red with a slight iridescence about it. The markings here are in gold lettering, and it also has "1LQ" incusely stamped on the top. 
Ron Petrzilka 
244 Church 
W. Chicago, IL 60185

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Dear Ron. 

These gismos have been reported on three previous occasions by Joe Maurath, Jr. in his insulator column in Old Bottle  Magazine (March, May & October 1975 issues). We still don't know what they are. They could be some form of insulator, but it shall remain my policy to put such items in the WHATISIT file unless their use can be attributed with a fair degree of certainty. 

The other three were all dug and were from Washington, Florida and New York. The wording arrangement and numerals varied on all specimens and was variously applied with black, gold or maroon lettering -- plus some elements incuse stamped. The Florida collector also has a grossly different item which is marked simply DEPOSE on its crown.

We've assumed these are of French origin, since the word "FRANCE" appears in the marking of one of the specimens. My daughter, who speaks fluent French and lived in France, gave me some guesses about the markings. She says DEPOSE in this use would mean "patented". Breve means "short" in French, and -ette (or ete?) is a diminutive in French and related languages. She says the SIMPLEX is probably a brand or trade-name. This is positive proof that the sun will continue to rise from an easterly direction and that approximately 200 of these porcelain gadgets in a burlap bag would make a very fine boat anchor. 

Jack

Dear Jack: 

I recently acquired a new porcelain insulator in trade and, although it's unmarked, I think it could be a new "G" item. It is Sin U-248, and I've enclosed a drawing of it. 

I have over 30 of the various "G" insulators, and this one has the "G" characteristics -- the speckled tan-brown glaze, made by dry process, the glazed pin hole with a very rounded top, etc. 

Unlike the other petticoated "G" insulators though, this one has a petticoat 1/2" long instead of a very stubby petticoat. Perhaps the company that made the "G" items made this style different with respect to the length of petticoat only. 

By the way, I would like to buy or trade for a U-272 "G" and a Sim U-55 "G". I have duplicate U-229 and U-236 "G" to trade, along with other porcelain or glass. If you know of anyone who has the 272 or Sim-55 to trade, sure would appreciate it if you could drop me a note on it.
David Bethman 
Bellinghan, Wash.

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Dear David: 

Sounds pretty convincing. We should naturally rely on the judgment of those most familiar with various insulator types, and you probably have seen as many "G" insulators as anyone around. I do think we can avoid the risk of having to say "excuse me" later on though if we say only this could be a "G" item and don't definitely tag it as such until one shows up with even a faint trace of a "G" marking. 

The very rounded top to pin hole is very uncommon in any insulators other than the "G" ones, but not unknown. The type of glaze isn't 100% definitive, because "G" came in other glazes also, some of which do look very much like glazes used by other companies. The longer petticoat is another minus for the comparison, since the other petticoated "G" items have uniformly stubby petticoats. 

All the "G" styles are made by dry process in a 3-part forming die (mold). On each, there is a mold line from the rim up to the widest point of the brow above the top wire groove. Then there is a mold line circularly around this brow of the wire groove. If your specimen doesn't show traces of mold lines like that, this would be a definite strike against it being a "G" item. 

Jack

Kerry Lavendoski (Brasher Falls, N.Y.) sent a letter to the National Insulator Association (NIA) with some detailed thoughts on a possible NIA project to take an interest in the future assignment and/or rearrangement of CD- numbers and U- numbers in the insulator Style Charts. He also requested that John McDougald, NIA president, forward the letter to Crown Jewels for its possible publication there. 

Dora thought it would possibly serve a good purpose if we printed excerpts from the letter together with comments on it, since she has received in the past several other letters which likewise involved publication of copyrighted material by the magazine or some other party not the copyright holder. Since I am better qualified than Dora to answer questions about the insulator Style Charts, she asked me if I could prepare a reply to the letter and comment on it in my column. 

I have used selected excerpts from Kerry's long letter (8 pages) which describe the nature of his presentation, and some portions are slightly edited for clarity or brevity. My comments following the letter are taken from my reply letter to Kerry. The detailed explanation about the creation of and updating of the Style Charts is not only pertinent to Kerry's inquiry but should be of interest to collectors in any event.

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Dear John [McDougald]: 

... I'm taking you up on your offer to write you about insulator matters as you invited fellow NIA members and insulator collectors in October 1977 Crown Jewels. 

... I've been collecting about 7 years now .... I still maintain a sizable collection of CD- numbers, color, Canadians, as well as threadless ones. I even have quite a few porcelains. I have seen the hobby grow from infancy to what it is now ..., and I much appreciate the pioneer efforts of Woodward, Milholland, Tod, Brown and countless others .... 

However, I'm just going to focus on one matter that I wonder if the NIA could take ... a more direct hand in. And that matter is the assigning of CD- numbers and U- numbers to insulators. These are the standards by which our collectables are organized, and I'm wondering if the best order has always been used in assigning these numbers. 

I profess to know very little about porcelain insulators .... So I'm not herein commenting on Jack Tod's decisions on assigning U- numbers to them. Perhaps porcelain specialists could better comment on that. 

[However,] my keen interest in the history and collecting of the earliest insulators (threadless ones) has always been marred a little bit by the fact that somehow, and by some one person or persons "along the line", these insulators have somewhat of a "mixed up" classification. From CD-700 to CD-744 seems to be rather well organized, but to have the 785, 788 and 790 lumped into the CD-785 to 804 miscellaneous-odd-style category is an injustice to them .... 

From what I've read, the CD- system was devised for threaded insulators (basically) and when so many threadless began to turn up, a spot just had to be found for them. Now The CD- system is brilliantly devised for the most part, starting with the arbitrary number of #100, and the decimal system defining slight variations is excellently conceived; but considering the apparent afterthought given to the threadless and foreign types, is it not possible that a slight change is in order? 

My suggestion is this: Since "true" threadless insulators predated for the most part all threaded insulators ,why not give them a complete category all to themselves? Perhaps the designation "T" for threadless (North American) could be used such as: 

• T-00 to T-09 = egg styles
• T-10 to T-19 = pin types, narrow skirt
• T-20 to T-24 = Wades
• [etc., 4 other small blocks ending at T-99] 

This way much greater space could be opened up to cataloguing threadless types ... and at the same time retaining a similarity to CD- numbers presently in use (ie. CD-735 would become T-35 etc.). Possibly the general designations of narrow skirt and wide skirt could be dropped for two of the categories, and then that would allow for some types now in one of the other of those categories to be reassigned. For example, the present CD-742.5 (a rather petite insulator) could perhaps have a "T" number all to itself along with other small ones that have turned up. 

This method ... would place true threadless insulators numerically before the threaded insulators [in the CD- Chart] and would ... place them before threaded types as to actual development too .... 

Now I'm wondering what part the NIA could play in such future redefining of insulators .... I think there is a need for this now ... Also a possible placing of only North American threadeds in The CD-100 to 375 .... [These changes] would free the CD-700 to CD-999 category for entirely foreign types. By changing things now ... we will [have] enough and proper space for yet unfound North American threadless types as well as the many non-North American types that will yet be found or made....
Kerry Lavendoski 
N.I.A. #1431

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Comments.

I think Kerry's suggestions are constructive and very well thought out, but I hope you will see from the following remarks that it just isn't in the cards for us to ever reassign the reference numbers in the published Style Charts for any such reasons. As an active worker in the National Insulator Association since its inception, I am always thankful for any suggestions members have, even if they may not be implemented for any of various reasons. 

I can speak only for the Universal Style Chart (U- numbers) for porcelain insulators, since that is copyrighted by me. Mr. Woodward would have to speak for the Consolidated Design Chart (CD- numbers) for glass insulators, since that is copyrighted by him. Possibly he would agree substantially with the comments I shall express below.

The Universal Style Chart (U- numbers) is copyrighted by me in my hook "Porcelain Insulators Guide Book for Collectors". All rights are reserved, and the Chart or major portions thereof may not be used in any other publication without my written permission. The U- numbers may be freely used by any individuals in any manner (articles, listings, ads, etc.) as long as significant groups of pictures, drawings or cross-reference lists to other systems are not published in any manner which would preempt the proprietary value of the published Universal Style Chart itself. 

I would never agree to the adulteration of my Universal Style Chart, including voluntary assignment of U- numbers or change in designation of the established U- numbers. Likewise, I would not agree to the use of my name (or a cross-reference of the U- numbers) being used in connection with any other similar style designation chart. I feel a strong obligation to the hundreds of collectors who now have and use my Style Chart not to make their books, checklists, trade lists and collection labeling obsolete by altering any of the published U- numbers, and I shall exercise my copyright claim in all ways possible to this end. 

There is nothing to stop the NIA or anyone else from creating their own style chart (it's a free country) as long as my material isn't used in its creation and as long as my U- numbers aren't cross-referenced to any other chart.

Experience has shown that it automatically creates havoc when the Style Chart for any collected item (insulators, postal canceling devices, or whatever) is altered after it has once been published and widely distributed. Indeed, Mr. Woodward and I corresponded at great length about the possible consequences of his making even minor changes in his reference numbers for several glass insulator styles when he adopted the decimal system to facilitate the addition of more numbers to his CD- Chart in crowded portions with no vacant numbers. There are hundreds of collectors who have the first edition of Porcelain Insulators Guide Book who have not, or never will, obtain the current second edition or any later possible editions of the book. You can imagine the horrors of newer collectors operating with Charts having numbers differing from the numbers in the Charts still being used by hundreds of other established collectors. Nothing like buying or trading for a Mickey Mouse (U-395) only to have it arrive and turn out to be some sort of Pony insulator (since the seller used a later alteration of the Style Chart)! 

It is thus prudent for anyone creating Style charts to think about how such SNAFU's can occur and then set down some ground rules to avoid then. 

First, and most important, the reference numbers should never he changed once they have been published. Once you publish a Chart showing the Mickey Mouse as U-395, you can't ever later change it to U-396, U-425, or anything else.

Secondly, if you later remove some style from the Chart and vacate its number, you shouldn't reuse the vacated number for some later addition. The SNAFU's that would result from reusing old numbers should be obvious. 

A considerable amount of thought must he given to reference number assignments when the Style Charts are being readied for first publication, since you know you're stuck with the numbers for given styles from there on out. The first porcelain U- Chart had only about 650 designations. Even at that, I guessed that half again that many additional styles would surface later with additional research at the factories and with collectors reporting styles not shown in the first publication of the Chart. 

I labored for weeks trying to arrange those 650 insulators in some logical order and completely wore out a perfectly good crystal ball trying to guess just where to leave the vacant numbers in the 1-999 block for inclusion of later styles unknown at that time. This was desirable even though the numbering system even initially was expanded by the use of suffixes (ie. U-98, U-98A, U-98B, etc.). It was a real struggle to determine where to place some items in the Chart; for instance, how about the U-100 which is both a duplex insulator and a transposition insulator! Some insulators were such odd styles they just wouldn't fit anywhere, and most of those were just lumped into the U-395 to U-435 area (and which subsequently got very crowded for any unused numbers as new oddities continued to show up). 

The number of new styles added after the original publication came out just about as I had predicted; there are 943 in the Second Edition of the book, and new additions are now down to a tiny trickle. Most of the new items did fit very well into the vacant numbers, but a couple of areas in the Chart became slightly crowded for numbers. My crystal ball had worked pretty well after all.

Even though both the glass insulator CD- Chart and the porcelain insulator U- Chart turned out admirably well in the end, the above discussion should make it clear that we will just have to live with any slight misarrangements caused by Woody and I not being able to work our crystal balls to perfection. Both Charts are too well established and universally used to ever consider altering them in terms of number revisions or replacement with some new form of Charts altogether. 

The sole purpose of the Charts is to provide reference numbers definitive to any insulator shape, and they are useful in magazine articles, trade lists, letters, ads, check lists, labeling collections, etc. As such, the reference numbers can be completely arbitrary, and the basis for Chart arrangement is purely to make it easy to find insulators in the Chart. This seems to work best if arrangement is based on size and shape (with some interior grouping such as telephone, power, grooved crowns, double petticoats, etc.). 

To some degree, this arrangement is incompatible with other arrangements concerning antiquity (as you discuss), manufacturer, pin hole sizes, etc. What the reference number is really makes no difference except for ease of finding the insulator in the Chart. Even if I saw a threadless listed as a CD-584379, I could always thumb back to that number in the Chart and instantly see what the fellow was talking about. That's what counts. It doesn't change the insulator's vintage, value, desirability or importance one iota if it happened to be designated CD-1. 

In both the CD- Chart and the U- Chart, reference numbers for threadless styles are in high-number blocks solely because the low numbers were already in use by other insulators in the first published Charts. In the case of porcelains, only several threadless were even known when the U- Chart was first created, and I hadn't been able to obtain drawings of even those by 1971. No telling what others might turn up in the future either, so I just reserved the numbers from U-970 to U-999 for anything threadless that ever did show up. It's simple, if you ever have the good fortune to get a porcelain threadless, just look on the last page of the U- Chart, and you'll instantly be able to see what its U- number is.

Admittedly, if all these threadless porcelains we now have had been known in 1971, I possibly would have put them at the start of the U- Chart. At the time, it would have seemed wasteful to use a block of nice low numbers for something which we didn't even know to exist for sure. Besides, the low numbers are handier for styles listed and traded every day. Just how often do we have to refer to the U-986, considering there's only one specimen known, and it's resting comfortably in someone's collection?

There you go -- a very long answer which possible befits the very long question.
Jack H. Tod N.I.A. #13