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AUBURN HEIGHTS PLUGGED IN
Over the 18 years that Tom Marshall wrote historical articles for the Weekly News, he would mention that his grandfather, Israel Marshall, built Auburn Heights with “modern” electric lights powered by a D.C. generator located in Marshall Brothers Paper Mill. Auburn Heights remained D.C. (direct current) powered until the estate was supplied A.C. power from Delaware Power & Light Company (predecessor to today’s Delmarva Power) in the 1930s.
While we’ve been inside Auburn Heights many times, it wasn’t until recently that we noticed something unique in how the mansion’s electrification was done. The mansion still retains many of the early-1900s push-button light switches with bright brass wall plates and original ceiling chandeliers and light fixtures. While scarce, one finds several two-blade (no ground) duplex electrical receptacles in most of the rooms. Only rooms such as the kitchen and study, which have seen remodeling, have more modern electrical fixtures and the occasional 3-blade grounded receptacle.
When Israel and his family moved into Auburn Heights in late 1897, the house would not have had electrical receptacles installed as they had not yet been invented! How did electrical appliances such as a fan or toaster get ‘plugged in’ during the first decade or two at Auburn Heights?
Answer
For a recent holiday event, we chose not to use the ceiling fixtures at Auburn Heights because most have modern, cold-white LED lamps installed that do not fit the period of the house with respect to color (electric lamps in the original fixtures would have emitted a yellowish spectrum candle-flame color typical of the glowing carbon lamp filaments of the era). To properly light the areas people would occupy, it was necessary to move some of the rarely used table and floor lamps to alternate locations as they mostly had proper incandescent bulbs remaining in them.
In moving the lamp fixtures, we noticed that many two-blade electrical receptacles are installed in the baseboards! We also recalled that portable appliances such as table and floor lamps, fans, irons, and heaters weren’t invented until the mid to later 1890s. While the British had invented electrical plugs and receptacles in the late 1880s, it wouldn’t be until 1904 that American Harvey Hubbell patented the first detachable electric plug (right) and receptacle for use on American electrical systems. Thus, with Auburn Heights constructed in 1897, it is unlikely electrical receptacles were installed during construction.
Edison patented his design for the first commercial electric lamp in 1880. By the mid- and late 1880s the electrification of America had begun. America’s electrification utilized simple, almost primitive, electrical components. Electrical watthour meters weren’t invented until the later 1880s and didn’t see use until the turn of the century so power initially entered a home through only a fused disconnect (electricity use was billed by the total ‘candlepower’ of electric lamps a homeowner had). From the disconnect which included a fuse, various circuits powered lighting fixtures were controlled from a pushbutton switch on a nearby wall. While Auburn Heights’ wiring is installed in the walls, many homes of the era retrofitted with electrical power had the wiring routed on the walls!
The Marshalls, known to take advantage of the latest technologies, might have purchased or were gifted appliances such as electric fans or table & floor lamps. Such devices were most likely supplied with an “Edison Base Plug” as shown above. These plugs were equivalent to the base of an Edison electric lamp but with the wiring to the appliance instead of a glass envelope to contain a glowing carbon filament. A “plug” of the era was designed such that it could be screwed into an electric lamp socket in place of the bulb (or with an adapter that accepted a plug and lamp) without causing twisting of the wire!
Sometime in the early 1900s, appliances would have been available with Harvey Hubbell’s earliest patented plug which is similar to today’s plug and receptacle except that the two blades are coplanar as seen in the first image. Hubbell also offered several Edison to Hubbell adapters as shown in the images below.
Within a few years Hubbell redesigned and patented a new plug configuration. Hubbell changed the coplanar blade design to a parallel blade design and implemented several improvements. This is the plug configuration we use today. During the 19-teens, appliances generally came with either Hubbell’s coplanar or parallel plug configuration. This created the need for receptacles capable of accepting either configuration of plug (see images below).
When Israel eventually did add dedicated receptacles to the mansion, one can wonder what he might have had added and when. More than likely the addition of electrical receptacles occurred in the 1930s when the house was changed over from the mills’ D.C. power to DP&L’s A.C. power. The easiest way to add receptacles is at the baseboards where fishing wires down into the basement was easiest and there is a secure piece of baseboard lumber for fastening the receptacle’s electrical box. We note baseboard receptacles at a number of locations within the mansion. As the parallel blade plug had become standard, the mansion may have had combination coplanar and parallel plane receptacles installed (similar to the right image above) reflecting the fact that existing appliances of the early 20th century still in use in the mansion relied upon coplanar plugs.
THE MAN WHO SAVED CHRISTMAS
Gilbert, as a boy, took an interest in magic. Gilbert’s magic act became his vehicle for paying his college expenses. In 1909 he started selling illusionist kits that included detailed instructions on how to use the materials in his kits for magic performances. In 1910, puzzles were introduced by Gilbert’s company, the Mysto Manufacturing Company. Complete tool sets were soon added to the toy line including benches, wood lathes, and scroll saws along with detailed instructions for construction.
Answer
In 1898, in England, Frank Hornby introduced the Meccano Kit, which was a simple construction toy involving various quantities of different lengths of identical ½” wide metal strips, each strip with a series of evenly spaced holes down its central axis. The kits also contained ½” x ½” angles of different lengths along with square and triangular plates also drilled with evenly spaced holes. The kits allowed children to construct whatever they could dream up.
Having seen Frank Hornby’s construction toy set, Gilbert knew he could improve upon Hornby’s design and features. In 1911 Gilbert offered the Mysto Erector Structural Steel Builder manufactured by the Mysto Manufacturing Company, which also offered his magic kits. By 1913 he had made further improvements by making the steel strips look like actual riveted beams of the era and was selling the improved version using just the Erector name. In 1916, with sales exploding, the company expanded and reorganized under the A.C. Gilbert Company name. By 1930 Gilbert had bought out his competitor, Meccano.
With the company’s name change, Gilbert also formed the Toy Manufacturers of America in 1916, which would prove vital to insuring children had toys for Christmas 1918. While World War I started in 1914, America’s participation was as a bystander. President Woodrow Wilson established the Council of National Defense in 1916 for the purpose of coordinating resources and industry support should America find itself drawn into World War I. The council’s charter was to coordinate America’s resources related to transportation, industrial production, farm production, financial resources, and American labor. The council’s objective was to support America’s position that “a country is best prepared for war when thoroughly prepared for peace.” In April 1917, the United States declared war on Germany and entered World War I with the defense council fully engaged.
By mid-1918 the Council of National Defense had focused America’s industrial and labor might towards manufacturing war related items. The Council banned the manufacture of many items considered nonessential. By the end of 1918 toy manufacturers had become concerned that while a few toy plants had been converted to producing war related items, the rest would be closed down as non-essential so that labor, energy, and raw materials could be redistributed. The result would be the toy manufacturer’s biggest income period of the year, Christmas, would disappear and resulting in many of the companies going out of business.
As president of the Toy Manufacturers of America, Gilbert arranged a meeting with the leaders of the Council of National Defense. During that short meeting, in addition to displaying a large selection of A.C. Gilbert Company toys, books, and other educational and learning toy materials, Gilbert stated:
“The greatest influence in the life of a boy is his toys.
A boy wants fun, not education. Yet through the kind of toys American toy manufacturers are turning out, he gets both. The American boy is a genuine boy, and he wants genuine toys. He wants guns that really shoot, and that is why we have given him air rifles from the time he was big enough to hold them. It is because of toys they had in childhood that the American soldiers are the best marksmen on the battlefields of France.
America is the home of toys that educate as well as amuse, that visualize to the boy his future occupations, that start him on the road to construction and not destruction, that as fully as public schools or Boy Scout system, exert the sort of influences that go to form right ideals and solid American character.”
Gilbert’s argument won the defense council over, and the discussions of closing America’s toy manufacturers as being non-essential was abandoned. The Boston Globe’s headline summarizing the meeting’s outcome was “The Man Who Saved Christmas.”
TAGGED IN DELAWARE
Readers of this column are no doubt aware that some Delaware residents take a keen interest in low-numbered Delaware vehicle tags. A pair of low-digit, Delaware tags sold at auctions this past October; #37 for $282,000 and #426 for $75,000. While Clarence Marshall once owned Delaware Tag 8, the Stanley Model 76 displays Clarence’s Delaware tag 76 making the Stanley unique in Delaware as the only vehicle with its model or series number also used as its registration and license plate number!
In addition to the standard automobile digits-only Delaware tag, there are twenty-three specialty tags issued for use on Delaware registered vehicles. Vanity tags are in addition to a standard motor vehicle registration tag and must be carried in the car while displaying the vanity tag on the rear bumper. The vanity tag or the standard registration tag are the only Delaware tags that may be legally displayed on the front of a vehicle with the provision that the vehicle’s issued vanity tag is displayed at the rear of the vehicle.
Delaware’s population is slightly over 990,000 residents as of October 2021. There are nearly as many Delaware motor vehicle registration tags issued as of October 2021 as there are residents. How many total motor vehicle registration tags have been issued to Delaware residents, businesses, corporations, including the state and county vehicle issued tags?
Answer
CORN COB ORGAN
Vintage Marshall music machines are displayed by the Friends in the Marshall Steam Museum. Those who tour Auburn Heights mansion experience the angelic sounds of the Regina Music Box. If you haven’t heard the Regina, check out this YouTube LINK of the Auburn Heights Regina being played.
The Regina Music Box was developed in Germany in 1889 by Gustave Brachhausen and Paul Riessner of the Symphonion Company. A few years later, in 1892, they relocated their music box business to the United States forming the Regina Music Box Company. Collectors have determined an estimated 100,000 units were shipped between 1894 and 1919. Some units automatically changed discs sequencing through a series of discs automatically.
While the Regina Music Box generates musical tones by plucking the tuned tines of one or two metal combs, an earlier design of music box relied on reed organ technology. These mass-produced units, manufactured by the Autophone Company, became known as ‘corn cob organs’. Where and/or how did the moniker ‘corn cob organ’ come into common parlance?
Answer
The Cane plant has been used for thousands of years to fashion reeds to produce a musical tone when a thin sliver of the plant’s stalk is set to vibration. Any material, when formed thin enough and of specific proportions, can be made to create a tone by setting it to vibrating mechanically. The pump organ, also known as a reed organ, is an example of an instrument were a series of brass reeds, each tuned to resonate at a specific pitch, produce music. In the 19th century, millions of reed organs were produced and found use in homes, churches, and other settings where hand-pumped pipe organs were not practical.
In the late 1880s, the Autophone Company in Ithaca, NY developed the ‘Gem Roller Organ”. These inexpensive hand-cranked music boxes were sold through Sears & Roebuck Company’s catalog and various retail outlets. Consisting of twenty, tuned, brass, free-vibrating, reeds (the notes starting with D below middle-C were: D G A B C C# D E F# G G# A B C C# D E F# G A) providing nearly three octaves of tone. The roller organs were tuned to the ‘scientific pitch’ of A=430 (concert pitch or A=440 in common use today wasn’t introduced until the 1920s and became standardized in 1936).
When the unit’s crank is turned, a set of bellows in the base of the unit generates a slight vacuum in an enclosure above the bellows. The reeds, mounted in a wooden block in two rows of ten, make up one side of an enclosure that is maintained at a vacuum from the bellows. When a valve external to the enclosure opens, atmospheric air rushes in the opened valve-hole to a small chamber beneath a reed The air continues past the reed to the enclosure under vacuum. This quick-moving airflow rushes around a narrow slit between the reed and the reed’s holder causing the reed to vibrate at its resonant frequency producing a tone.
Instead of a tin disk similar to what the Regina employs, the Gem Roller Organ relies on a 6-3/8” by 1-3/4” wooden cylinder held by a pair of shafts mounted in a cast frame. The wooden cylinder is encircled with 0.036” diameter pins standing 0.1” off the surface such that the pins push open the valves as the cylinder rotates about its axis to open and close the valves. As the cylinder rotates when the unit is cranked, a cylinder surface revolution of 0.1” opens and closes a valve. Pins sequentially spaced at 0.1” keeps a note playing until the last pin passes the valve playing. As the cylinder rotates it also moves axially requiring the pins be arranged in a spiral rotation about the cylinder’s surface. A song plays for forty seconds requiring three complete revolutions of the wooden cylinder. Click this LINK to hear a restored Gem Roller Organ playing.
The wooden cylinder, or ‘roller’ as the instructions referred to them, and the spiral rows of pins determining which valves should be open and for how long, gives the appearance of a corn cob and hence these music boxes soon were referred to a ‘corn cob organs’. Production in the late 1890s and early 1900s exceeded 10,000 a month with Sears selling them for $3.45 in 1902. Collectors have identified over 1,000 different song cobs available. Cobs sold for $0.18 each through Sears. A patented machine made the cobs in batches of twelve by duplicating a master song cylinder. In 2002 several collectors constructed an automated machine to produce new cobs relying on computer technology and modern mechanical designs.
STEAM PEDAL POWER
Currently adorning the Marshall Steam Museum is a collection of vintage pedal cars. From a private collection, they are on loan to the Friends of Auburn Heights while the collection awaits auction in the late fall. While there are no Stanley, White, or Doble steam pedal cars on display, we are wondering if any pedal cars might have been mass produced that were modeled after one of the major steam car manufacturers?
Answer
According to multiple sources, the child’s pedal car dates back to the 1890s. As there were both wooden and metal horses mounted on wheels for children to ride in the 1800s, once actual motor carriages began to appear, the evolution of a toy motor carriage propelled by little feet followed suit. The first cars were simply moved by the child’s feet on the ground and bending at the knees to move the toy about. In the 1890s the idea of changing the rear wheel axle shaft to a crankshaft configuration, adding rods with pedals ‘under the hood’ so the toy car might be propelled by the child riding it was a natural evolution. Thus began the pedal car as we know it today.
Pedal cars were available through the Sears, Montgomery Ward, and other catalogs and were shipped as freight to the local railroad station where they might be picked up. This limited pedal car availability to affluent families at the start of the 1900s thus vintage pedal cars are rare and expensive for collectors. In the 1950s, mass production and the ability to ship crates of cars to department stores reduced prices and increased availability making pedal cars very popular. Toledo, Ohio became the ‘Detroit’ of pedal cars with American National Company absorbing several pedal car manufacturers in the 1920s to become the world’s largest children’s vehicle manufacturing company by the 1930s. The company’s ‘Skippy Line’ featured pedal cars patterned after the major car models of the era.
The Great Depression nearly stopped all pedal car production and production did stop during World War II as all non-essential metal use was prohibited. After the war, the ‘drive train’ for some manufacturers changed to a bicycle chain between sprockets making the cars easier to pedal. To attract sales, pedal-vehicles changed to include trucks, locomotives, airplanes, and even boats. The era of the all-metal, rider-pedaled, pedal car ended in the 1970s with Louis Marx & Company’s Big Wheel all-plastic tricycle and its safety features. By the end of the 20th century the classic metal pedal car was replaced by the plastic, electric motor powered, toy car!
To the best of our research, no Stanley, White, or Doble pedal cars were ever commercially mass produced. There are two Stanley pedal cars in existence. Both were one-of-a-kind custom built. Photos of each are shown on this page. If you’re wondering the value of a vintage pedal car it is similar to an actual vintage automobile or even an antique item. Generally, there are five major considerations; age, condition, percent original, demand, and rarity. While most pedal cars trade owners for three- or four-digit figures, a few have commanded a five-digit auction price!
