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Having a Ball – the First One – May 1950

Posted in Art and Artists on March 5, 2016| Leave a Comment »

As I expected the Program from the first Artists Equity Association Spring Ball, held in May of 1950 turned up recently. The story of the Association and these fundraiser balls is told in my earlier post “Having a Ball”. What I didn’t expect was to find I had a very flawed memory regarding my mother’s entry in the program and, apparently, my father’s and Herbert Kliegl’s role in getting her the commission.

There can be no doubt that Joe Presser got the Kliegl Brothers ad via my father’s friendship with Herbert Kliegl. I can only assume that my mother’s ad for Century Lighting was via the same path. Century was new to me but a little searching reveals that both companies were not only operating in the same arena and era but that there were mutual friendships among staff members. This clip is from the excellent “A Brief History of Stage Lighting” (http://www3.northern.edu/wild/LiteDes/ldhist.htm)

Kliegl No. 5N
5″ 1000 watt spotlight

Klieglight
8″ 1000 watt spotligiht1936

1904: Louis Hartmann builds a small (5″ lens) spotlight, a baby lens, which used a 50 candle power (approximately 50 watt) lamp for David Belasco’s production of The Music Teacher.
1906: Hartman uses 4– 250 watt baby lenses (in addition to 31– 1,5000 watt carbon-arc spots) in Belasco’s The Rose of Ranchero.
1907: Edison General Electric introduces the 500 watt lamp.
1911: Edison General Electric introduces a “concentrated filament” lamp for use in a lens hood (spotlight).
1913: Kliegl Brothers markets the No. 60, a 5″ Baby Spot built around a 100 candle power lamp. According to the catalogue, the unit provided a “mild ray of light.”
1913: The 1000 watt lamp becomes available.
1916: Designer Norman Bel Geddes replaces the carbon arc lamp in a lens box with a 1000w incandecent lamp.
1920s: 5″, 6″ and 8″ PlanoConvex spotlights (lens hoods), using a 1000 watt lamp, begin replacing the Lime Light and Carbon Arc lamp.The illustration on the left is of a Kliegl No. 5N, a 5″ Lens Box with a 1000 watt lamp (1926). Note the similarity between the No 5 and the No 5N.
1929: Kliegl Brothers introduces the Fresnel lens spotlight.
1933: Both Kliegl Brothers (Klieglight) and Century (LekoLight) introduce the ellipsoidal reflector spotlight.
1971: Altman Lighting introduces the 360Q axial ellipsoidal.
1992: ETC introduces the Source4® ellipsoidal reflector spotlight

Herbert Kliegl was known as a prominent citizen of Forest Hills and a lover of the opera and theater and a benefactor of the arts. His support of Artists Equity was to be expected.