|
Date |
Manufacturer |
Notes |
Outside of Box |
Inside of Box |
| ca
1925 |
Rudges |
Produced by Rudges
circa 1925, this outfit uses machine made pinecone lamps, with no
exhaust tip. The color is flashed onto these bulbs, rather than
being hand painted. Rudges made lighting outfits for a very short
time. |
 |
 |
|
ca 1926 |
Woodwin
(C.D. Wood Electric Company) |
This outfit by the
Woodwin Company has beautiful box art that was done by Worth
Brehm in 1921, originally for General Electric and used by Woodwin by 1924. Entitled "His First
Christmas", the picture depicts the wonderment of a child looking at
his first Christmas tree while his parents peek from behind the
parlor curtain. This is a very hard to find outfit, that includes
the patented "Tatchon" connector, the patent for which
revolutionized the Christmas lighting industry. See
Lester Haft and his 1924 Patent on
this site for more information. 1926 was the last year of
Woodwin's christmas lighting operation. After this date, the company
merged with several others to form the NOMA Electric Corporation.
|
 |
 |
|
In 1926, Eugene Kukla invented a small
wooden bead, usually painted red (and sometimes, but rarely, found
in green and even blue) that was attached below the outfit light
sockets and served to hold the lamp upright on tree branches. It was
a common but incorrect belief that Christmas light bulbs would burn
longer in an upright position. The C.D. Wood company licensed the
manufacturing rights to this invention, and some circa 1926 Wood
strings indeed have the bead on them. NOMA became the owner of the
rights to manufacture the beads through the 1926 merger with Wood
and other companies,
and trademarked them as "Berry Beads". These beads were used on the
majority of NOMA outfits until well after World War II. |
Patent Drawing |
The Berry Bead |
| ca
1926 |
Decorative Products Corporation |
Although this box pictures and contains ordinary C-6 cone style
lamps, they are strangely referred to as "Decorative Ornaments",
apparently a creative marketing ploy. |
 |
 |
|
1926 |
USALITE |
In 1926, several companies
formed a trade association which was named the National Outfit
Manufacturer's Association, or NOMA, for short. Two of the
companies, USALITE and Deal Electric, used identical box art for
their outfits when they joined the association. The USALITE version
is pictured here. The company stayed in the association for just a
few short months before dropping out. |
 |
 |
|
1926 |
Deal Electric |
This
Deal Electric set of lights uses box art identical to the set above,
and is from the year that Deal Electric joined the NOMA Association.
|
 |
 |
| ca
1927 |
NOMA |
The classic NOMA
box, from that company's first full year operating as NOMA Electric
Corporation, 1927. The outfit has ribbed cone tungsten filament GE
MAZDA lamps. This year (1927), NOMA copyrighted the box art, which,
previous to this time, was used by other companies in the NOMA trade
association as well (see notes above). Later versions of the outfit
(after 1929) are in a box of the same
design, but with less color. This box design was used well into the
1930s. |
 |
 |
|
1927 |
NOMA |
Compare this set with the earlier
Starlite set on the previous page. Except for the reflectors, this
outfit is identical in almost every way. The box is now marked as a
NOMA brand, however, and inside carries a threatening message about
infringement on NOMA-owned patents. The Starlite name was originally
owned by the Tinsel Corporation of America, who later merged with
other small Christmas lighting companies to form
NOMA. This box is an example of how NOMA used up the stock of the
companies that merged in its formation. |
 |
 |
|
1927 |
NOMA |
This outfit from NOMA is identical to the set pictured directly
above, but features smooth-cone Japanese carbon filament lamps
instead of the more expensive Mazda lamps. Many variations of this
set are available to today's collector. |
|
 |
|
ca 1927 |
American |
While
the box art on the outside cover is identical to the outfit pictured
directly below, the companies that sold the two are completely
different. This set from American Decorative Lighting features a
colorful inside flap, a duplicate of the outside cover that was used
on earlier versions of this outfit. |
 |
 |
| ca
1927 |
Good
Lite |
A circa 1927 outfit
by Good Lite, featuring typical GE Mazda fluted cone lamps. |
 |
 |
| ca
1927 |
Propp |
In 1927, Propp
reworked their box art, with this result. Boxes like this were
issued well into the mid 30s even after their merger with NOMA, with
the later boxes not being as colorful. |
 |
 |
|
In 1927, General Electric
first used the large, intermediate size base for their new outdoor
Christmas light bulbs. The outfits that lighting manufacturers sold
consisted of 7 lamps, and were wired in parallel so that the failure
of a single lamp would not affect the rest. The earliest of these
lights are round (center), but by 1928 they were the familiar
swirled or flame shape. Also, the early lamps were painted on the
outside (right), but later issues feature a scratchproof inside
color (left). These lamps are still made today, although they are
once again smooth rather than textured, and the color is on the
outside. It is interesting to note that General Electric and the
various Edison Electric distribution companies sponsored many
neighborhood "decorating with color-light" contests in an effort to
induce sales of the new outfits. Their strategy worked quite well,
as within several years communities all over the United States held
friendly decorating competitions at Christmastime. |
 |
|
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