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CLICK HERE FOR THE TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE AND LINKS TO ALL PAGES ON THIS SITE TABLE OF CONTENTS HISTORY THE TIMELINE MANUFACTURER'S HISTORIES THE PATENT PAGES THE PRE-ELECTRIC ERA VINTAGE ADVERTISING THE LIGHT SET GALLERIES RELATED LINKS VINTAGE ADVERTISING Much information can be gleaned from vintage advertising. Public attitudes and decorating preferences are often reflected in the types of articles advertised in popular magazines of the day. Additionally, new products available on the market often were seen first in advertising just as they are today. This category presents some examples of advertising for early electrical decorating products. It is interesting to note that the cost of these items was extremely high for their era, often so high as to be unaffordable to the average American family. As a result, items we consider common today, Christmas light bulbs, for example, were frequently rented rather than sold.
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This is a page from an 1898 Western Electric catalog showing their socketless series lamp, often used for early storefront window decorating, and sometimes used on Christmas trees. These lamps retailed for fifty-five cents each in colored glass, the equivalent of about $10.00 today. As you can see, an average Christmas tree containing just twenty of these lamps would cost $200 just for the lamps, let alone the cost of getting electricity to the house. Add to that the expense of hiring a wireman to connect everything, and you can immediately see the prohibitive cost of early electric trees. |
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From the November 24, 1900 edition of Scientific American, here is a very early example of an ad especially for electric Christmas lighting. Notice that the ad mentions renting the lamps, and also lists bulbs designed to operate on 50 to 60 volts, a common voltage for "home generated" electricity. For homes not connected to the city mains, portable generating plants were available to those who could afford to purchase them. They used gasoline engines to generate the power, and were both noisy and smelly. But during the time of this ad, electricity was still considered by many to be only a novelty, and even large cities were slow to install electric distribution facilities. |
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Produced in 1903, this advertising booklet from General Electric extols the virtues of electric Christmas lighting. Color printing was quite expensive in 1903, but General Electric was heavily advertising their new decorative lighting products, and considered the expense justified. The Edison Miniature and Decorative Lamp Division of GE was one of the first major manufacturers of electric Christmas lighting. Note that the ad also states the outfit is approved by the National Board of Fire Underwriters, which later became Underwriters Laboratories. |
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| Appearing in the December 14, 1901 issue of the Scientific American Magazine, this advertisement stresses the safety aspect of electric lighting, pointing out that there is no danger, smoke, smell or grease when using Edison miniature lamps. The ad also refers the reader to the booklet pictured above. |
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| Here is an advertisement for "Winking Fairy Lights for Christmas Trees". The ad was placed in the December, 1907 issue of Hardware Dealer's Magazine, a publication for store owners. I have not seen any earlier ads for blinking Christmas lights, and the information provided in the piece is fascinating. The set advertised is battery operated, and it appears from the ad that the set is intended to light a table top sized tree. Click on the thumbnail to the right to see the ad. The file is a bit on the large size, but I wanted to assure clarity when viewing. I'll be more than happy to send the file by e-mail for easier viewing to anyone who requests it. You can contact me by Clicking Here. |
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This ad is from a 1919 Sears, Roebuck and Company catalog, and shows a very typical lighting outfit of the time. Notice the porcelain junction box located at the top of the tree, that allows additional festoons of lights to be added to the outfit. The catalog was intended to be used as an "in-store" information resource for customers, and therefore does not have pricing. |
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| Both of these advertisements appeared in the December, 1921 issue of the Electrical Record, a trade magazine for retailers of electrical and lighting equipment. The ad on the left is from Triangle Electric Trading Company, a small player in the business who did not remain in decorative lighting activities for long. The ad on the right is from The C.D. Wood Company, a business that was heavily involved with both decorative lighting and electrical accessories, who eventually merged with NOMA in 1926. |
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Printed in 1920, this advertisement from Deal encourages dealers to stock the new outfit that featured a lightweight connection or junction box made out of composition. The junction box allowed the addition of more festoons of eight sockets. Previous junction devices were made of heavy porcelain, which made decorating difficult. The new composition junction box was much lighter and smaller, and this allowed for easier placement and concealment on the tree. |
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| This ad ran in the November, 1913 Edition of The Electrical Record, a trade publication for electrical dealers and manufacturers. It talks about the then fairly new figural lights being imported from Austria and Germany. The Franco company mentioned was a lighting outfit manufacturer. |
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| Also from 1920, the Liberty Electrical Company sold this outfit, listed as an "economy" outfit for that year. Intended for a table top sized tree, the set has no provisions for adding additional sets and uses the soon-to-be old fashioned carbon filament lamps. Outfits like this one were best sellers for their time, allowing even moderate income families to enjoy the wonders of a modern but small electric tree. |
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Vintage Advertising continues... CLICK HERE FOR THE TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE AND LINKS TO ALL PAGES ON THIS SITE TABLE OF CONTENTS HISTORY THE TIMELINE MANUFACTURER'S HISTORIES THE PATENT PAGES THE PRE-ELECTRIC ERA VINTAGE ADVERTISING THE LIGHT SET GALLERIES RELATED LINKS |
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Note: This is an archive of the late Bill Nelson's "Antique Christmas Light" web site as it existed in 2001. Except for contact information, link updates, and some information that has been lost, we have attempted to keep the text and illustrations as Bill presented them. However, the original pages included much outdated HTML code and graphic conventions, so we have done a lot of work "behind the scenes" to bring you this archive. Consequently:
OldChristmasTreeLights? and FamilyChristmasOnline? are trademarks of Breakthrough Communications? (www.btcomm.com).
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