Posted 11 months ago
earthandma…
(116 items)
02/12/2025
Hello,
There are not many of these pins out there: a very early Western Electric Company. This is the original design including the intertwined letters. The pins are marked on the reverse 14K gold.
I have a couple other of these pins, which I was told they were originally small badges, in a red color (but no gold). Later, the pins had a Western Electric banner floating over the 48 states of the U.S. Then, the company added the hawk clutching the candlestick telephone (removed the banner). All, as described, are highly collectible. Western Electric manufactured the telephones for Bell Telephone. They had "works" in Indianapolis, Columbus, and Baltimore - among other locations.
Enjoy!
earthandmagneto, Cool. :-)
I really like that WECo monogram.
That elongated C seems to have been a popular one. Here's some components of vintage exercise equipment with the intitials HDAC (Health Dev. App. Co.). intertwined in a similar manner:
https://www.collectorsweekly.com/stories/302949-gym-set
Hello keramikos,
Yes, the interwined letters were very popular around the turn of the 20th century; however, I am not completely sure why. But, sometimes the intertwining letters can help me date an item.
The oldest telephone pin I have features only a receiver, but with letters intertwined. It turns out the pin is approximately from 1919, maybe around the time this type of lettering was fading away. The reciever only pointed to me a wood wall phone, before the candlestick. These were my only clues. After researching, I found the pin was issued by Couch & Seeley, a company who manufactured telephones. Yet, these WECO pins may be older because of the stud screwback...
Thank you for your comment!