Tung-Sol was an American manufacturer of electronics, mainly lamps and vacuum tubes.
History In 1904, the company started as a small business in New York City, with Harvey Wilson Harper and two brothers, Herbert E. and Herbert C. Plass. The Plass brothers operated the Howard Electric Novelty Company at the time in New York City. Harper had received a patent in 1904 for a "Machine for Making Incandescent-Electric-Lamp Bulbs," for a machine improving the production of bulbs. The company invented electric lights for Christmas trees as well as production of 2-inch 2-rail toy train model equipment between 1904 and 1906. In 1911, the company stopped its production of the trains in order to concentrate on bulbs and radio tubes productions.
Lamp experience and beginnings
Harper had worked since 1897 with miniature lamps. By 1900 he worked at General Electric as head of the miniature lamp department. In 1907, the Howard Miniature Lamp Company moved to 327 Academy Street in Newark, New Jersey then in 1914, relocated to East Orange, New Jersey on 338 Main Street. Their production of automobile headlight incandescent bulbs were replacements for oil and gas lighting system on automobiles. The company relocated in 1915 to Springfield Avenue and 19th Street in East Orange. Harper sold this company to General Electric in 1916 to avoid patent infringement. In 1917, the Howard Incandescent Lamp Corporation was incorporated and operated at 95 8th Avenue in Newark, New Jersey. The founder was Harvey W. Harper. Their early products were mainly geared towards the automotive market and included headlamps, pilot lights, and flashlight bulbs. Tung-Sol Lamp Works was licensed to produce lamps in tungsten-filament from General Electric through royalty-free rights for their patent. Tung-Sols' license was a B license allowing only paying a quota and percentage of production for large or small bulb manufacturing to General Electric without exports of goods. Tung-Sol Lamp Works made miniature lamps under this system with another miniature maker called Chicago Miniature Lamp Company. Another company called the Consolidated Electric Lamp Company made large lamps under the B license agreement. These three companies were in production in 1925 with the last B licenses as General Electric no longer issued them from 1917 to 1925. Only Westinghouse had the A type license at this time, to make large and small lamps with the rights to use the patent that General Electric had on the tungsten filament type lamps.
Company incorporation tube expansion In 1920, there was a picture of the Miniature Incandescent Lamp Factory with boys sitting on the steps held in the Newark Public Library. https://archive.org/details/Immerso5_0018 In 1924, the Tung-Sol Lamp Works was incorporated with an electric bulb with a tungsten filament product. The trade name was formed from the first syllable of "tungsten" and the Latin word "sol" meaning sun. The new company had Harvey Harper as president and tinkered with radio tubes at Newark's 8th Avenue factory. On April 8, 1930, the company (Tung-Sol Radio Tubes Inc) was listed in the Wall Street Journal in their "Broad Street Gossip" column as an RCA licensee. In 1935, Clyde C. Bohner was vice-president in Charge of Engineering and discussed information on radio tubes with a company magazine sold to the public, such as an article, titled, "How to Get the Best That's on the Air at Home and Abroad." In 1939, the company still produced miniature dial lamps as the screw or bayonet type with different volts, amps, candle power, bead color, and bulb type dimensions or specifications. In 1941, radio tubes continued being sold to radio broadcast stations as R. E. Carlson was vice-president in Charge of Sales during this time. Circa 1948, there was a picture of the Tung-Sol Factory at the corner of High Street and Eighth Avenue by Thomas Pallante located in the Newark Public Library. https://archive.org/details/Immerso5_0037 The location of the factory was in the First Ward of Newark and employed up to 600 people, half of them from this Italian neighborhood. Several sales offices were in the United States.
Expansion in the 1920s-1940s
The company entered the electronics field in the 1920s. We can determine from an advertisement in Dry Goods Economist, dated June 1, 1920, that Tung-Sol had jobbers responsible for selling lamps, without inventories, filing of reports, warehouse distribution and turning a profit for the merchant selling to a customer. One such jobber was the Independent Light and Wire Inc at 1737 Broadway in New York City, that handled Tung-Sol lamps for merchants and then could sell the lamps to customers. In June 1926, three adjoining property buildings located at 111-117 High Street near the 8th Street plant was purchased for expansion. In time they established themselves as leaders in the development and production of vacuum tubes, with their main competition including RCA and Sylvania. In fact, Tung-Sol had published the "Around the World with Tung-Sol World Radio Log" in 1935 as a sort of radio guide with information on domestic, international stations and articles with charts and tables. It also promoted the company for servicing of radios with its tubes, especially, "The Tung-Sol serviceman is no further than your telephone" motto. Lamp Works made an announcement to stockholders on October 14, 1935, for increased capital. The approved increase was 210,000 shares of no-par preferred stock, with 80 cents cumulative dividends a share, and $1-par value common stock at 500,000 shares. In 1941, many United States broadcast stations were using radio tubes by Tung-Sol as evident in literature provided with the broadcasters dial indicators. In 1943, there is a data sheet with copyright on the 703A ultra-high frequency triode vacuum tube used for the Joint-Army-Navy contract NXSR-81414. The Governing Board of the American Institute of Physics approved Tung-Sol Lamp Works as a firm approved by the Board on February 26, 1944. In the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, there were digests of papers presented at a conference on electron tubes for March 29–30, 1948. Mr. C. Everett Coon of the Tung-Sol Lamp Works, Inc., Bloomfield Electron Tube plant provided citations on the various electron tubes on major industrial applications. An unclassified letter from MIT Lincoln Laboratory of the Office of Naval Research was sent to C. F. (typographical error) Coon on April 21, 1949, by E. S. Rich with subject matter about Life Tests on 5687 Tubes. This correspondence was related to a project that would simulate airplanes in flights using a computer system named Whirlwind 1 that had a memory test computer and a transistor computer. The 5687 tube was a miniature twin triode under brand JAN and military specification number 80C being produced in Bloomfield plant. A JAN brand was Joint-Army-Navy and USN brand was United States Navy for military purposes type over civilian versions.
Post-war expansion
Between 1941 and 1946, Tung-Sol had undertaken extensive expansion of its plant and equipment in the field of miniature and sealed beam lamps. In 1945 a post-war expansion program allowed a $1 million secured loan, and the company listed another plant in Brooklyn in 1946 for manufacturing and also acquired a Pennsylvania electronic tube plant it was operating under lease agreement for war production. Tung-Sol moved machinery to the acquired plant in Pennsylvania from its Brooklyn and Newark plants that were idle in work due to labor shortage after the war. In 1946, Tung-Sol had about $1,6 million expenditures, by doubling the facilities that were not owned in 1941 and had begun making its own machinery, purchased items from external sources, glass blowing of miniature bulbs, and purchased General Electric and Westinghouse bases.
1950s
In 1950, the Pennsylvania plant called Weatherly, had over 1300 employees. By 1951, they began doing business as Tung-Sol Electric Inc. Tung-Sol was also active in the semiconductor industry, with its transistors being easily recognizable by their sky blue color. The Whirlwind I computer at MIT had vacuum tube issues that a visit from Tung-Sols' Mr. E. C. Peet and Remington Rands' Mr. J. J. Lamb visited on December 18, 1951, as a JETEC Task Force to provide short-testing techniques, objectives, and discussions. The Bloomfield plant hired engineers to study circuitry problems involving the use of electron tubes and semiconductor devices; in the applications laboratory. A degree in electrical engineering, electronic engineering or physics was required but considered applicants without experience due to a surge in transistor work. The semiconductor production market increased from four companies in 1951 that made transistors for the commercial market to 15 in 1953. And out of those 15 manufacturers, Tung-Sol was one of eight of the companies making transistors as a major manufacturer of vacuum tubes. In 1953, Tung-Sol Lamp Works, Inc. was listed as a participating member of the Armed Forces Communications Association, an organization needed for national security with employees or officials in electronics to advise and assist with various aspects such as manufacturing or procurement. In October 1953, Tung-Sol was involved with General Electric and Westinghouse in an anti-trust lawsuit with various other lamp manufacturers, due to the practices of General Electric licensing percentages of lamp production from the 30s and 40s. Continued support and assistance from Tung-Sol by C. Everett Coon with knowledge in receiving tubes was needed for the Joint Computer Committee in 1953 where he was chairman of a sub committee between engineers of tube manufacturing companies and design engineers of computer equipment. In 1956, the Hazleton, Pennsylvania building was bought to transfer the automotive flasher unit production from another nearby factory. In the 1950s, the New Jersey locations of Bloomfield and Washington with the Weatherly, Pennsylvania were manufacturing tubes. Another Northern New Jersey location owned by Tung-Sol was called Chatham Electronics, and was a manufacturer of industrial tubes. The Chatham Electronics, Newark, New Jersey subsidiary was listed in the May 11, 1951 Federal Register as contractor for Department of the Army products with contracts: DA-28-043-SC—5422, DA-36-039-SC-6665, DA-36-039—SC-7309, DA-36-039-SC-8411, DA-49-170-SC-21, and NObr 52059. The Weatherly plant produced its 100 millionth vacuum tube unit in 1953, since it began in World War II manufacturing them. A MR stamping on a tube was civilian versions for "maintenance and repair."
Electron tube tests In January–February 1953, Tung-Sol described testing procedures for the Electron tube in an issue of SIGNAL, magazine. The advertisement and imagery had a naming as Wham-O. Every electron tube was subjected to a physical "beating" by a machine. A table would have four electron tubes mounted and that machine would provide a tremendous jolt applied by a heavy-duty steel ram smashing the movable table. The significance of having four electron tubes in the test was to simulate the four directions, insuring stability in every direction. The machine was accelerated at 1000 times the pull of gravity. (The pull of gravity is 9.8 meters per second squared and represented 1000 times greater as, 9800 m / s2.) This procedure gave the electron tubes that were mounted this tremendous abuse in attempts of conducting reliable service potential. The test insured the preferred high degree of uniformity specified by the armed services. There were other exact test procedures and inspections for the electron tubes to be mechanically and electronically sturdier in use or greater dependability.