Griswold Number 8 Base Quiz

[Tom Neitzel]

This post is really more for the real waffle iron nerds, but it is fun anyway.

I posted this quiz on the Waffles Facebook page a week or so ago so if you saw the answers there, wait a little before answering to see if we have some new folks that can figure it out.

I'm posting pictures of 5  Griswold number 8 waffle iron bases from around the turn of the 20th Century.  They all have a letter on the photo, A through E.  Rest assured, each is an individual base in my collection - no duplicate photos.    For B and D I've included a little closer photo of the socket area just for clarity.

Now the question.  Which of these bases are pattern number 884 and which are number 975.  Not too hard - right?

I will give you a hint.  Three of them are 884 and only two are 975.  One of them is pretty easy to identify positively, but can you be sure of the others?  If you want, you can give your reasons for the choices.  Don't have to though.

I'll post the answer with photos either tonight or tomorrow morning in this thread.

Tom

[Tom Neitzel]

Here are the answers.

A, B and C are all have pattern number 884.  D and E have PN 975.

Except for A, can you tell which has which PN just by looking at the top?  There really are no differences except for the pattern number.

The turn of the 20th Century was a time of innovation and change at Griswold for waffle irons.  Experiments with a replacement for the finger hinge were happening.  The finger hinge base did get an 884 PN.

Now for my assumptions.

I think the raised socket base started out with the 975 PN.  It is shown in the patent for the acorn hinge.  The acorn paddles got PNs 976 and 977.  It would seem to make sense to give that base PN 975.  It was more labor intensive (AKA expensive) to mold since a core would have been needed to put the bottom on the socket and keep the drip trough continuous.

I know what would become the ball or split socket base was starting to show up around the same time, but you find the early ones with an 884 PN.  I'm sure they didn't worry about the reuse of the number since the finger hinge was essentially obsolete.

The ball socket base would have been less costly to make and would do the same job, so I suspect the swapped it into production giving it the 975 number.  I had assumed the raised socket pattern would have just been discarded, but it seems that they gave it the 884 number, hopefully to just keep it from being used accidentally.  I was unaware of this number on this base until recently.

Anyway, the real lesson here, even if you are not a waffle nerd, is to not assume you know what something is just by looking the top of it.  Pick stuff up and open it to see what is inside, if applicable.

The photos are of the bottom of each base and have the same letters as the top views.

Just FWIW.

Tom

[Will Person]

Very interesting Tom. So from what I can see, the raised socket acorn hinge bace got both numbers. I have a number six at home, and I will have to take a look at what the numbers are on that base, and what is on the paddles too. Will report back in a few hours.

Found pictures of the paddles, the number on them is 971.

Edit.....my base is marked 970!

[Tom Neitzel]

Very interesting Tom. So from what I can see, the raised socket acorn hinge bace got both numbers.

The acorn raised socket exists with 884 and 975 pattern numbers.  The split ball socket base also exists with the 884 and 975 pattern numbers.  I'm not sure I would expect to see something similar with the 6, 7 and 9 since the number 8 was the most common and would seem to be modified first.  But who knows what is out there, just remember to look at the bottoms - LOL.