Artifact 16 - lamp stem in glass base and lamp socket with key switch made by Sir Hiram S. Maxim 1880. One can only guess why this broken lamp artifact is in this collection. Was this lamp perhaps complete at the onset, but was sacrificed in the lab or at court in order to examine, test, and verify the filament material? This lamp base has Maxim's famed rare blue glass post (see Artifact 12 - H. S. Maxim 1880). Because this lamp base is open it allows the extraordinary opportunity to physically examine up close the Maxim blue glass lamp lead-in stem post, the lead-in wires, and Hiram Maxim's unique tiny filament "screw" clamps. A string tag label is attached to the lamp base, the tag has a hand written note by William H. Meadowcroft (Notary Public), the note states, "Maxim Lamp, Rec'd from Hiram S. Maxim, Nov. 1880." The number "16" is penciled in on the reverse side of the tag. William Henry Meadowcroft was the New York County Notary who notarized Edison's evidence used in 1883 in the court trial - "Edison v. Maxim v. Swan." Meadowcroft went to work for Edison and became his personal liaison, publicist, and his secretary for half a century. For reference, an early litho drawing of this socket is found printed on page 194 in the book "Edison's Electric Light, Biography of an Invention" by Robert Friedel & Paul Israel with Bernard S. Finn, Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, NJ 1985 (paperback first edition 1987). The Maxim Lamp picture caption reads, "Maxim Lamp 1880, . . . installation of the Maxim light in the vaults and reading rooms of the Mercantile Safe Deposit Company served notice to Edison and the Electric Light Company that they could wait no longer to commercialize their product." Further reference is found on page 79 in the book, "Evolution of the Electric Incandescent Lamp" by Franklin Leonard Pope, published by Boschen & Wefer, New York, NY 1894, "The first commercial incandescent lighting plant in New York City was started by this company (United States Electric Light Company, Hiram S. Maxim) in the autumn of 1880, in the reading rooms of the Safe Deposit Company, in the basement of the Equity Life Insurance Building, at 120 Broadway."
2006 is this artifact's 126 th. Anniversary
