What is it? Prewar Controller content

It's the voltage controller (speed controller) for an early Ives transformer - catalog cut from the 1923 Ives catalog.

Robert S. Butler posted:

It's the voltage controller (speed controller) for an early Ives transformer - catalog cut from the 1923 Ives catalog.

Thanks Robert!

Ain't this forum great or what!  🙂

I especially like the line power connection!   Not many plugs in the 1923 household, they had to take a light bulb out!

Dry Cell, DC, AC, light bulb connections, light bulb voltage regulators.... the things folks did back then!

Rob English posted:

Dry Cell, DC, AC, light bulb connections, light bulb voltage regulators.... the things folks did back then!

Now I'm only 44 but I remember when I was a kid I got a chemistry and electrical set for Christmas as a child. How I didn't set fire or blow up my parents house with that still amazes me. What we considered toys back then are outlawed today

or this one seems a little dicey to give to a kid>

Jagrick posted:

or this one seems a little dicey to give to a kid>

I had to look this up. See the attached link.

http://statemuseumpa.org/chemcraft-uranium-toy/

The set included an actual sample of uranium ore! Hope you don't have one you have been storing as an antique!

George

At the risk of hijacking this thread that ChemCraft set was child's play compared to my favorite book on building your own home lab and running experiments. Some of the experiments and recommended methods in  the book were dangerous.  Still, with the exception of the time I misread the amount of chemicals to add and filled most of the house with H2S (fortunately it was summer and all of the windows were open) I ran the experiments without incident and learned a lot in the process.