Energy & Power - Overview
The Museum's collections on energy and power illuminate the role of fire, steam, wind, water, electricity, and the atom in the nation's history. The artifacts include wood-burning stoves, water turbines, and windmills, as well as steam, gas, and diesel engines. Oil-exploration and coal-mining equipment form part of these collections, along with a computer that controlled a power plant and even bubble chambers—a tool of physicists to study protons, electrons, and other charged particles.
A special strength of the collections lies in objects related to the history of electrical power, including generators, batteries, cables, transformers, and early photovoltaic cells. A group of Thomas Edison's earliest light bulbs are a precious treasure. Hundreds of other objects represent the innumerable uses of electricity, from streetlights and railway signals to microwave ovens and satellite equipment.
"Energy & Power - Overview" showing 506 items.
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Thomson DC Generator
- Description
- This model of a direct-current generator was designed by Elihu Thomson to produce a constant voltage. It could also be used as a motor that would maintain a constant speed. It came to the Smithsonian from the U. S. Patent Office, representing patent number 333,573, issued to Thomson on January 5, 1886. The patent itself indicates that no model was submitted (which is not surprising since by that time models were not required), and this example was probably given to the Patent Office at a slightly later date for display purposes.
- Thomson and Edwin Houston were school teachers in Philadelphia in the 1870s when they formed a partnership (the Thomson-Houston Company) to enter the new and competitive arc-lighting field. They produced a number of successful generators, motors, meters, and lighting devices. Most of their system employed alternating current, which was as good as direct current for lighting. With the development of the transformer in the mid-1880s, AC systems assumed added importance because electricity generated at a low voltage could now be converted to high voltage for more efficient transmission and then converted back to safer low voltage for use by consumers. But electro-chemical applications (like plating) required DC generators, and, until the invention of a practical AC motor by Nikola Tesla at the end of the 1880s, street railways depended on DC.
- Thomson-Houston merged with Edison's company in 1892 to form General Electric.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1886
- patent date
- 1886-01-05
- associated person
- Thomson, Elihu
- associated company
- Thomson-Houston Electric Company
- maker
- Thomson, Elihu
- ID Number
- EM*252663
- catalog number
- 252663
- patent number
- 333573
- accession number
- 49064
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Mercury vapor lamp, type H1
- Description
- The type H-1 mercury vapor lamp represented a significant advance in commercial-industrial light sources. Prior to the H-1, mercury lamps contained large amounts of the toxic metal, and most were large and awkward to use. The H-1 featured a small amount of mercury contained in an internal hard-glass "arc-tube" mounted inside the lamp. Compared to previous mercury lamps, the H-1 was a compact and convenient device.
- This particular unit is a first generation model from about 1934. A wire grid seen wrapped around the arc-tube helps the unit to start. Later models used a special small electrode for that task. Use of the internal arc-tube allowed the lamp to operate at high internal pressure, resulting in better energy efficiency. While not the first high-pressure mercury vapor lamp, mass production of the H-1 and its ease of use led to its wide adoption. Today's mercury vapor and metal halide lamps can be considered refinements of the H-1.
- Lamp characteristics: A brass mogul-screw base with glass insulator. Hard-glass arc-tube with mercury drops visible on the inner wall. Two mandrel and re-coiled tungsten electrodes. Dumet and stranded wire leads connect the base to the electrodes. Starting electrode-grid wrapped around arc-tube and connected to frame. There is no starting resistor in this lamp. Welded connectors. Tipless, T-shape envelope. 400-watt rating.
- Mercury vapor lamps are one type of discharge lamp. Other types are fluorescent and neon tubes. They make light by passing an electric current through a gas, and require additional devices called ballasts to operate properly (not seen in the pictures). More information about how discharge lamps operate is on our website Lighting A Revolution.
- Date made
- ca 1934
- date made
- ca. 1934
- maker
- General Electric Company
- ID Number
- EM*318195
- catalog number
- 318195
- accession number
- 232822
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
General Electric Demonstration Fluorescent Lamp
- Description
- In the late 1920s and early 1930s, reports began reaching GE and Westinghouse of French experiments with neon tubes coated with phosphors. A phosphor is a material that absorbs one type of light and radiates another. American scientist Arthur Compton, a consultant to GE, reported seeing a green French lamp giving 30 lumens per watt in 1934, and his report sparked an intensive, cooperative research program to make a fluorescent lamp. In 1936, this tube using low pressure mercury vapor and a coating of phosphors was quietly demonstrated to the Illuminating Engineering Society and the U.S. Navy.
- In 1939, GE and Westinghouse publicly introduced fluorescent lamps at both the New York World's Fair and the Golden Gate Exposition in San Francisco. Other lamp makers like Sylvania and Duro-Test soon followed. The need for efficient lighting in wartime factories brought rapid adoption of fluorescent lighting and by 1951 industry sources reported that more light in the United States was being produced by fluorescent lamps than by incandescent lamps.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1936
- maker
- General Electric Company
- ID Number
- EM*318197
- catalog number
- 318197
- accession number
- 232822
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Weston Potential Indicator
- Description
- In the 1880s—the early days of commercial electric power—convenient, rugged, and reliable instruments for measuring that power did not exist. Engineers had to struggle with complex, delicate, laboratory-type instruments that required leveling, calibration, and manipulation to yield a reading, which then required calculation to yield a meaningful number. Edward Weston, an immigrant English entrepreneur and electrical inventor and engineer, developed this instrument for measuring direct current potential, patented in 1886, to answer the demand for a better way. Although its leveling screws, delicate suspension, and glass shade (now missing) betray its laboratory antecedents, the hefty magnet, the moving coil design, and the "direct reading" pointer and scale show the direction in which Weston was heading. His subsequent instruments soon secured a worldwide reputation for reliability, precision, and ease of use.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- about 1888
- maker
- Weston, Edward
- ID Number
- EM*318562
- accession number
- 232729
- catalog number
- 318562
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Incandescent lamp with ductile tungsten filament
- Description
- In 1904 several European inventors almost simultaneously developed lamp filaments made with the metal tungsten. These gave better energy efficiency than older carbon lamp filaments. However, tungsten proved a difficult metal to work. A pressing technique called "sintering" was used, but the resulting filaments were brittle and could not be bent once formed. Called "non-ductile" filaments, they required a complex mounting structure with several filaments placed one after the other in the electrical circuit.
- William Coolidge, working at the General Electric Research Laboratory in Schenectady, New York, began investigating how tungsten lamps might be improved by making a bendable or "ductile" wire. In 1909 he found an answer. By putting an ingot of sintered tungsten through a series of hot swagings and drawings through successively smaller dies, bendable wire of many diameters could be made. GE began selling Coolidge's lamp under the trade name "Mazda" beginning in 1910. Since it was the second generation of tungsten filament lamps, it became known as the Mazda B.
- Mazda B lamps sold well throughout the 1910s and 1920s. The heavy copper hooks supporting the filament in this particular example tell us this is an early Mazda B lamp. It dates from around 1911.
- Lamp characteristics: Brass medium-screw base with skirt and two glass insulators. Drawn tungsten filament with 6 upper and 5 lower heavy-copper support hooks. The black material seen on the lower hooks is called Needham's getter. It bonds chemically with oxygen and helps keep the filament from burning up. The stem assembly features crimp-style connectors, offset leads, a Siemens-type press seal, and a cotton insulator. Tipped, straight-sided envelope with taper at neck.
- Date made
- ca 1911
- date made
- ca. 1911
- ID Number
- EM*318637
- catalog number
- 318637
- accession number
- 232729
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Battery: Voltaic Pile
- Description
- In 1800, Alessandro Volta of Italy announced his invention of a device that produced a small but steady electrical current. His "voltaic pile" operated by placing pieces of cloth soaked in salt water between pairs of zinc and copper discs, as seen in this 1805 pile from Canisius College. Contact between the two metals creates a difference in potential (or pressure, or "voltage"), which in a closed circuit produces electric current. Voltaic piles mark the origin of modern batteries.
- Before Volta's invention, electrical researchers like Benjamin Franklin worked with static charges. They learned much, but were limited by the fact that the electrical discharge was at very high potential and very low current; it also could be produced only in very short spurts. A source of flowing current allowed wider-ranging experiments that resulted in greater understanding of the links between electricity and other natural phenomena, including magnetism and light and heat. Batteries attracted the attention of many scientists and inventors, and by the 1840s were providing current for new electrical devices like Joseph Henry's electromagnets and Samuel Morse's telegraph.
- Date made
- 1805
- associated person
- Volta, Alessandro
- ID Number
- EM*323886
- catalog number
- 323886
- accession number
- 252896
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Reproduction Edison Lamp with Box
- Description (Brief)
- This lamp was mass-produced for the centennial of Edison’s invention.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1979
- ID Number
- 1984.0314.03
- accession number
- 1984.0314
- catalog number
- 1984.0314.03
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Prototype Reflector Lamp
- Description (Brief)
- Reportedly the first ellipsoidal reflector lamp. See U.S. patent #4,041,344 issued to Frank LaGuisa.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1976
- maker
- General Electric Company
- ID Number
- 1985.0410.01
- accession number
- 1985.0410
- catalog number
- 1985.0410.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Daystrom 046 Mainframe Computer, "Little Gypsy"
- Description
- This section of the Daystrom 046 consists of the multiplexer, logic cabinets, and auxiliary memory. The 046 was manufactured by Daystrom's La Jolla division and was the company's first product utilizing transistors and core memory. Daystrom guaranteed a 99 percent availability, which was demonstrated at Louisiana Power & Light's Sterlington Plant. This 046 is the second purchased by Louisiana Power & Light. It was installed at the Little Gypsy Power Plant in 1961 in LaPlace, La., and was the first computer to control a power plant from startup to shutdown.
- Date made
- 1961
- maker
- Daystrom Incorporated
- ID Number
- 1990.0551.01
- accession number
- 1990.0551
- catalog number
- 1990.0551.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Standard Carbon Lamp
- Description (Brief)
- Typical carbon filament lamp tested at the National Bureau of Standards.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1905
- ID Number
- 1992.0342.01
- catalog number
- 1992.0342.01
- accession number
- 1992.0342
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center