Discussion on “transformation of electric power into light,” and “new types of incandescent lamps,” New York, November 23, 1906

Wm. J. Hammer: If you go back to the first efforts made by inventors in the field of incandescent lighting, you will find that they were mainly devoted to metal filaments, metallic oxides, and rare earths. Subsequently, the pendulum swung in the other direction, and with the development and perfection of the carbon-filament lamp, attention was concentrated upon that. With the exception of a few inventors, work on the metallic filament was at a standstill. Now the pendulum has swung to its original position and we are having this remarkable development in the metal-filament lamp, which bids fair to displace the carbon-filament lamp; but who shall say that perhaps later the pendulum will not again swing in the other direction? Thus does history repeat itself.