Porcelain "Whatzit" and Tidbits

This month’s column has a few interesting bits and pieces to pass along with regard to Canadian insulators. The first is a true “whatzit”. This item was picked up at a garage sale last summer and is a bit of a puzzle. The glaze has a few fine stress cracks in it and seems “deep”, as though there were several coats of clear sealer used on it after it was baked. It has a 1” threadless pinhole and measures 3 3/4” across the base and is only 2” high. There are also no mold lines in the caramel colored glaze. The best guess is that it was made by a pottery craft person for an insulator collector. There is no name on it and it really doesn’t fit any of the known U#s in American of Canadian porcelain insulators. The wavy rounded edges indicate it was hand made rather than machine pressed. A Foreign use or origin can pretty well be ruled out also. Thanks to both Elton Gish and Rick Soller for helping to identify such an oddball item. It turns out Rick has 2 or 3 similar items in his collection.

CD 122's on old pole The other interesting thing that has come my way is this neat picture taken by Al Hall. This picture shows 2 newer CD 122 { Dominion - 16s ? } still on their side pins. While this is a rare site these days, the thing that is even more interesting is the metal support that has been installed around each side pin. There must have been a heavy cable or really long pole span at this spot to warrant the use of such a support. The lineman must have had no worries about the insulator only being a cd122 rather than a larger style, as he figured the side pin would be the weakest part on the pole.

Great news for the upcoming OVIC 2006 insulator show, April 22nd in Perth Ontario! The National Insulator Association has agreed to assemble a Canadian version of their Altered Insulator Display and for the first time this display will be seen outside the lower 48 States. With more and more suspect insulators being made available to the hobby, this is a great opportunity for collectors to check out some known-to-be-faked insulator colors. This is done with a display of before and after portions of the same insulator. The display will feature both Canadian and American insulators.

With the Internet being such a wide-ranging tool for so many areas of life these days, fake insulators and “art” items can turn up anywhere. Canadian collectors are just as likely to be stung with a lump of art glass as our American friends. I know a lot of serious NIA and personal effort has gone into this display and hope collectors find the trip to OVIC 2006 both educational and enjoyable.

For more information on OVIC, check out the web site at http://www.insulators.info/clubs/ovic

Some of this column’s photos are used with thanks to Al Hall. The header insulator for this column is an indigo blue CD 718 Canadian threadless insulator.

As always, feel free to contact me with comments, contributions or topics you might like to see covered in future Canadian Forum columns.

Good Collecting ............. Robin

Robin Plewes, Almonte Ontario, Canada.

Phone: 613-256-7638 or Email: highdome@gmail.com

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