Germantown graphic designer connects with grandfather in quest for Philadelphia gas street lamp

In November, Zachary Bird was hanging out in the 'burbs with his dad, Bill, when he saw the light.

The handsome, 10-foot, cast-iron Victorian lamp with a crown in the motif of acanthus leaves sparked a conversation - and that led to a quest, more modest than Sir Galahad's, but no less epic for the 46-year-old Zack.

Traveling deep into the web, Zack learned intimately about Victorian gas lamps (down to the 1891 Welsbach patent for the gas mantle), discovered connections to Disneyland and a dentist/pilot/businessman/collector, followed leads to Cape May County, and traversed a field of dreams in South Jersey.

But let's back up a bit first.

On that late fall day, the younger and elder Birds, both graphic designers, had wrapped up a visit to the Wharton Esherick Museum in Malvern. Before returning to Philadelphia, Zack suggested swinging by his father's childhood 1959 Colonial home on Mountainview Road in Berwyn.

The current homeowners offered a tour. As the Birds departed down a brick walkway that his grandfather B.B. built, Zack noticed the stately Victorian lamp. Since his youth, he has taken to lamps like a moth, having amassed a collection of some 100 old-style devices, including a Wilmot & Castle operating lamp (his first find) and a 1930s double holophane pendant for sale ($2,500) at his website www.birdstudio.com.

"What's this beautiful lamp?" asked Zack, a Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts-trained muralist who does work for the Palm Restaurants. He stood under a black-painted streetlight with an unusual octagonal pole and a bonnet of handblown milk glass.

"Oh yeah, this is the lamp that B.B. brought home one day and had us all come out and take a look at," said his father, William "Bill" Barwell Bird, 76. "We had no idea what Dad was doing."

What B.B. did was rescue the circa-1899 has-been gas city street lamp, electrify it, and then install it in his front yard, adding a touch of Victorian elegance to this stretch of Mountainview Road.

B.B., a scratchboard artist for magazines and newspapers, had been successful enough to buy into the new Berwyn development of custom houses. At the time, the buzzword in Philadelphia was modernization, and Mayor Richardson Dilworth was looking to electrify the city. Out went most of the city's gas lamps.

One day in 1959, B.B. was driving home from work when he saw "a mountain of lamps," as one version of the family story goes. Another account has him at a yard after being intrigued by a PGW ad for the scrapped lamps. Either way, B.B.'s wallet was 10 bucks lighter as he drove off with a lamp in the back of his pale-blue Ford Fairlane station wagon. The rest is Bird history.

"He saw it for what it was, which was this beautiful piece of memorabilia," Zack says. "From that perspective, it didn't need to be melted down. It needed to be put back in service."

Around the same time, Ralph Cox, a Cape May County dentist-turned-entrepreneur, bought loads of Philadelphia's street lamps, as many as 1,000, by one report. Remember that name. Fifty-seven years later, his grandson and B.B.'s grandson would meet.

Initially, Zack's quest for a lamp of his own, an authentic, turn-of-the-last-century Philadelphia gas street lamp to install outside his Germantown house, just like his grandfather did, sent him deep into the internet.

"They're functional design," he says. "Who isn't drawn to things that glow?"

Zack turned up pieces and parts, lots of broken lamps. (Cast iron, over time, is very brittle.) But he didn't want what he called a "Frankenstein" lamp. He kept at it. He discovered that Cape May County has working gaslights from Philadelphia and that Disneyland might, too. But none of that helped Zack find his holy grail.

His frustration mounted until he hit the jackpot with a chat-room post. "I'm the guy you want to talk to," it read. It was from Ian Harris, grandson of Ralph Cox.

Harris explained that his grandfather, a curious story unto himself, flew missions for the Navy and later started an airline (that the CIA may have shut down), and collected antique cars, fire engines, even a steam locomotive. Cox apparently used one of his planes to haul the Philadelphia lamps to a field in Cape May County, selling some to the Shore town, one to Disneyland (family lore says) and other locales, but keeping many in storage.

"Our grandfathers were kindred spirits," Zack says.

So Zack made the trip out to the field, where he practically tripped over lamps, and bought 26. He hauled the 250-pound posts in his truck three at a time to his backyard, and is now restoring their luster with love in his home studio next to the dining room.

So far, he has sold several for $3,000 each and along the way has become quite the expert on all things concerning gas street lamps. Did you know, he notes, that Baltimore was the first U.S. city to be lighted by gas street lamps?

Ben Brown, a building contractor, bought one for the front of his Chestnut Hill house. Why?

"Have you seen one?" he responds to what he views as a superfluous question. "They're pretty beautiful, don't you think?"

As for Zack's own quest, he of course picked one out for himself. The gas lamp has a fluted post that glistens black, and the date 1899 in raised numbers. It sits at the side of his house - he's reluctant to mount it on the curb for fear a car might dent it while grabbing one of the tight parking spaces.

Any day now, Zack expects the gas line to be connected - no electrification for him - and a piece of Philadelphia history returned, at last, to its rightful place.

"It's a connection to my grandfather," he says. "I'm reclaiming a piece of true grandeur and elegance from my past."

Lkadaba@gmail.com

@exinkygal