old ELECTRO-MATIC TRAFFIC CONTROL cabinet

These don't come up very often anymore, so I kinda jumped on it at the swap meet even though I don't yet really have any good idea what to actually *DO* with it -- the only thing I can guarantee right now is that it will NOT get re-purposed into a smoker grill?!! <nono>

It is a heavy cast aluminum 'tombstone' shaped cabinet measuring 33" h, 22"w, and 14"d that was first made to hold traffic signal controller equipment on a pole at some intersection somewhere, I don't know where. Its main locking door clearly shows what its intended contents were, along with the fabulous ELECTRO-MATIC 'winged-tire' logo (including the words TRAFFIC ACTUATED) which is actually on what's called a "police door", a smaller door on the main one which allowed access to a couple simple control switches that could be used by traffic cops to manually operate the intersection when necessary. Inside there is now nothing but brackets for a missing shelf and its model/serial# plate on the door -- and the 'ghosts' of equipment past -- believe it or not I recognize some of those shadows/patterns as the locations of former things that first lived in this box. :-)

On its outside it still has what's left of its probably original faded green paint, now showing a little bit (comparatively) of corrosion from the elements (maybe it served someplace near a salt-water coast?) and several names/etc. that've been scratched into it. Some collectors would want to strip/repaint/'restore' it because of all that -- but I, OTOH, love it JUST THE WAY IT IS... ;-) ;-) ;-)

I can't say for certain, but it likely dates from the 1960's at *latest*. ELECTRO-MATIC (part of the AUTOMATIC SIGNAL DIV. of EASTERN INDUSTRIES INC. of Norwalk, CN) was a company that (as their logo emphasizes) pioneered the usage of various methods of then-technology to actually allow the equipment at an intersection to *detect* cars pulling up to a red light and more importantly to **react** to them, by changing the light "on demand" instead of a strictly timer-based system. Their work and innovations were revolutionary in the 1930's-40's during their heyday, and there is historical record of enormous and complex systems (rooms-ful of big boxes of blinkielights and switches and knobs and meters, OH MY?!) that operated all the traffic lights in entire large cities, from a central location. By the late 60's or so the company had more-or-less been "consolidated" out of business, as traffic technology continued to naturally improve itself.