OVER the past decade or so, a new variant on the Bell lamp fixture theme has been popping up on Brooklyn streets. I haven’t noticed them yet in any other borough. They are subtly different in the shape of the “bell” and the glass reflector bowl is a little shallower that the previous classic design. Beforehand, retro-Bell fixtures employed on bishop crooks, Twins, Type Fs and “Corvingtons,” the long-masted versions found on main and wider streets, had been slavish imitations of the original Bells.
Perusing photos of NYC from previous decades, I can deduce that the Bells and their rivals, the rounder “Gumballs,” first arrived on NYC streets in 1938-1939. Previously, main streets were lit by fixtures I call the Acorns (seen here), which had a somewhat tapered shape and incandescent bulbs in white glass. They were preceded by even older styles when electric-powered lampposts first appeared in 1896 on 5th Avenue.
Since I spotted the “new bells” first on Surf Avenue in Coney Island I thought they may be restricted to areas prone to flooding during Atlantic Ocean storms; but I’ve now started seeing them elswhere such as 5th Avenue in Park Slope, where I snapped this one. Incidentally they aren’t to be confused with another new version I call the Abe Lincoln (seen on this page), since they resemble the stovepipe hats favored by the 16th president.
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4/17/24