University of Texas at Austin

Geddes-designed counter scale for Toledo Scale Co.
1929
Charcoal, pen, and ink
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Norman Bel Geddes Database

Job 152, Toledo Scale Co. - Store Fixtures, 1929-1931

Summary: To create a lighter-weight counter scale (the Toledo Scale Company’s counter scales weighed 163 pounds), Bel Geddes recommended using sheet steel instead of porcelain enamel cast iron. The search for a durable coating for steel led Geddes to the idea of making the scale entirely from plastic, an idea that so fascinated the company’s president, Hubert D. Bennett, that he abandoned Geddes’s sheet steel concept, financed the development of Plaskon, a cellulose-filled urea formaldehyde molding compound, and established the Toledo Synthetic Products Company to produce it.

This material consolidates jobs 137 and 140. Photos were used in Horizons (1932), pages 229-231.


(click image for description)

Box/Location Folder Description
box 8 152.1 Job record Nov1928-Apr1929. Contract Dec1928. Amendment Aug1929.
box 8 152.2 6 Schematic drawings, 6 sketches, 2 mounted renderings, 1 photostat of rendering.
flat box 1b 152.1 1 Rendering of Island Scale.
oversize box 7 152.1 One rendering of scale.
flat file 152.1 5 Sketches, 3 drawings of Island Scale and Counter Scale.
box 8 152.3 Record Copy Book (photographs separated).
box 8 152.4 Publicity --- Copy. Letter rec. 1930.
box 8 152.5 Publicity ---- Magazine clipping.
photo box 3 152.1 8 Record Copy Book photographs of 4 renderings, captions c1930, 1931.
photo box 3 152.2 Publicity --- 2 photographs of renderings, 4 photographs of prototype model. Data --- 6 photos of existing product.
negative box 1 152.1 Negative of Counter Scale. [damaged]

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