Awards Bob & Phoebe Adams Showmanship Award Featured here are nearly 50 battery jars, chloride accumulators, glass battery legs, lidded jars and battery signs, and battery oil bottles. Many of the early battery jars had an open top with a copper or carbon electrode in the jar and a zinc electrode suspended from the jar top. DC electrical power was generated during an electrolytic chemical reaction. A series of such cells could be used for lower voltage applications such as telegraph, telephone, railroad signals, etc.