Early Neon Signs

Many of us are old enough to still remember when classic neon signs were a common sight throughout our city’s landscapes.  Although used worldwide, neon signs were very popular in the U.S. starting from the early 1920s to around 1960.  In fact New York City’s Time Square was the site of some of the world's most famous neon signs of which many were designed by Douglas Leigh, a pioneer in outdoor signage.  As a testament to the widespread use of the signs in the U.S., by 1940 there were almost 2,000 shops producing neon signs.

Neon signs consist of electric lights made from long, luminous gas-discharge tubes filled with rarefied neon or other gases.  Wikipedia explains that, “Neon lights are a type of cold cathode gas-discharge light.”  The sealed glass tube has metal electrodes on each end and is filled with several different types of gases at low pressure.  When electric volts are sent to the electrodes, the gas in the tube ionizes and emits colored light.  In order to produce various colors of light, a mix of different gases and chemicals are used such as: hydrogen (red), helium (yellow), carbon dioxide (white), and mercury (blue).

Probably one of the reasons why neon signage went out of style was due to the nature of its labor intensive, customized production process.  Since the signs are almost an art form to produce, were it not for the fact that the neon signs had such a long lifespan; it would not have been economically feasible even back then to produce the signs.  With the decline of the industry, many cities are now making efforts to preserve and restore the antique signs. 

Today, Voltarc Technologies Inc., which is a part of the LightSources group, is one of the most recognized leaders in the signage industry and architectural lighting.  Our highly customized and standard products include fluorescent sign lamps, neon tubing, long lamps, U-lamps, and our unique cup-cathode construction that provides unsurpassed electrical life to the TriLight Max Series of fluorescent lamps.

LightSources and its affiliated companies – LCD Lighting, Voltarc, LightTech, and Cerlux represent the leading high-tech designers and manufacturers in the lamp industry today.  Our products are used world-wide in a multitude of applications and industries such as our avionic display backlighting that is part of the National Defense and US Space Program.

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neon_sign

Image by:  Rolf Süssbrich