CD-202 Hemingray No. 14 - Georgia Transpositions

By Jack Kesling; posted August 30, 2020

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I'm starting to go through my boxes that hold much of my collection of insulators from Georgia collected between 1968 to 1972. One insulator I found - that I've not previously posted - was my CD 202 Hemingray /No. 14; Back - Patented / May 2, 1893 - it's Hemingray Blue with sharp drip points. These transpositions were all found on the Central of Georgia telegraph line from Macon, GA to Fort Valley, GA. They were all on the third tier of a five tier pole. The third tier appeared not to be in use. My box notes indicate that I found 17 of these - most had some chips to the base / sharp drip points etc. with only about 3 or so in mint to VNM condition. Another interesting point was that all were used with only one wire (when there was a wire) and none were used as a traditional transposition. All but 2 of the 17 were traded into the hobby.

I did a search of the ICON website and have found that the Hemingray No. 14 is relatively rare. I found the following: CD 202 Hemingray No. 53 with 57 hits; CD 202 Locke No. 14 with 51 hits; CD 202 no name No. 14 with 36 hits; CD 202 K with 26 hits; and the CD 202 Hemingray 14 with only 4 hits. The question I have is why did Hemingray change the name of the CD 202 style from No.14 to Hemingray No. 53? Maybe one of our Hemingray experts (Bill?) can answer this question. My first thought was that maybe there was a "Patent Infringement" case with Fred M Locke. However; the CD 202 Locke No. 14 has a patent date of May 22, 1894 which is later than the Hemingray No. 14 patent date of May 2 1893. Any information or speculation on the above question will be most welcome. I will post pictures of the front, back, and drip points of the Hemingray No. 14.

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