Stimson Reflector
date: label: date made
content: ca 1935
name: label: maker
content: Stimson Reflector Company
notes: label: Description
content: Reflectors are small fixtures that outline vehicles, signs, and road surfaces and help prevent collisions at night. In the mid-1920s, Jonathan Cass Stimson, a St. Louis inventor, patented an improved “central triple reflector” with angled, cube-shaped cells that reflect light rays back to their source regardless of direction. He formed two companies to manufacture reflectors of this type and sold them to many customers, including General Motors, Ford, and other automobile manufacturers. His early reflectors were made of glass, but he made the transition to plastic and coined the name Stimsonite for his plastic reflectors. Stimson reflectors were widely used on automobile tail lights, highway signs, guard rails, road flares, railroad signals and yards, airport signs, marine beacons, bicycle fenders, and other applications.
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: Transportation, Road
label: See more items in
content: America on the Move
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content: Transportation
label: See more items in
content: Road Transportation
label: Exhibition
content: America On The Move
label: Exhibition Location
content: National Museum of American History
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Gordon W. Bowie and Mary Stimson Bowie
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1997.0243.30
label: catalog number
content: 1997.0243.30
label: accession number
content: 1997.0243
objectType: label: Object Name
content: reflector
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: leather (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: plastic (reflector material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 13.5 cm x 5.5 cm x .375 cm; 5 5/16 in x 2 3/16 in x 1/8 in
label: Measurements
content: reflector: 5 cm; 1 15/16 in