Featured Student lamp rescue

Sharing - found in Missouri, I have to save it ! Not a 19h c. example, but a 1930's - 40's electric, all solid brass (not the lesser plated steel). There was quite a Victorian lighting esthetic fad in the mid 20th c. I will find any parts needed to complete this . . . addicted to lighting and willing to admit it.

 

Missouri, eh? Good eye there, Drew!
It’s a beauty and if anyone can get it in working order, it’s you. Good luck finding the proper shades!! Please share the final result with us when you’re finished.

 

That's very handsome. Please share with us results of your efforts when you're ready.

Debora

 

Oh I love these lamps!! That'll look gorgeous once you're done with it. Awaiting the before-after pix with great anticipation!!

 

Was it modeled after a gas light?
It's lovely, Drew, just as found!

 

After a kerosene lamp - gas lighting most often was fixed to wall gas source via a gas line. Though there may have been some set-ups I'm not to up on. Though, gas lighting did often look similar to this (classic Victorian design). Many of the 1880 to 1900 oil lamps were converted to electric . . . these will have a real oil tank, signs of socket installation & often a hole drilled for the cord. Mine has a faux tank and cord enters the base like any electric lamp, making it a early/mid 20th c.

 

This style of lamp is modelled after the early whale-oil lamps that operated in the early 1800s. The oil was very heavy and viscous. Because of that, it didn't rise up the wick so easily. Because of that, the oil reservoir had to be placed ABOVE the wick (that's what that ball thing is in the middle of the lamp) so that the oil would seep DOWN to the wick via gravity. THEN you could light it.

In the later 1800s, they developed cleaner-burning kerosene which was more fluid, and could actually rise up a wick, so lamp designs changed.

 

Thank you much for this detail, I've learned something about the early lamps . . tank above the wick in the early lamps. I think the fondness of 19th c. designs is rooted with the 'Form follows function' of designs - they're just pleasant to look at.

 

Nice grab!! I'd put a safer plug on it so it doesn't burn down your house

 

There's a parallel to that, Drew: Function is Beauty.
I agree, absolutely!