This piece was acquired by Joe Maurath, Jr. during July 1970 in Rockland, Massachusetts on an abandoned fire alarm telegraph line. Two others like it are known in this blue color and were found by others in subsequent years. The second known was acquired from the Whitman (MA) Fire Department Alarm Division storage room sometime around 1973. The other was part of a spectacular discovery in Randolph, MA. Like the Whitman, MA piece both were found in a barrel full of glass insulators in supply rooms. Joe originally approached each of the above FD Signal Division supervisors back in the late 1960s but he was denied access to their dusty, old insulator stashes. The Randolph piece was reportedly found by a bottle collector from that town who had the right "connections" around 1975 to find the third-known blue Diamond-P... along with numerous other examples of this type which were of yellow-greenish vaseline, light jade packed with bubbles, cornflower blue and several other truly exotic colors! Joe already had a nearly identical array by then (1975) which came from various locations. The Randolph find was so much like Joe's Diamond-P spread that a local collector who had seen the Randolph pieces actually called Joe to ask him (in mid-1975) if his collection had been stolen! It obviously was not! It is believed that the Randolph Diamond-P grouping remains intact and in a New York State collection. More photos of Joe's amazing Diamond-P's will be forthcoming in the near future. |