The Canajoharie Darley

The Canajoharie New York Darley traffic light is finally back in New York. This signal came down in 2013 I believe. A fellow collector got it and moved if to Ohio. In late November 2018, it came back home to New York again.

It was another one of those “I’VE GOT TO HAVE THAT” signals. I didn’t realize someone I knew who is a member of some of the same signal groups (yes, thats a thing) had this light. So my impulsive self made the deal and then figured out how to get it here. UShip once again came though with a couple of bumps along the way, but it’s here. 

It’s quite the different signal. It was right down the street from Canajoharie New York’s “dummy” light. That light sits in the middle of an intersection. This one by my best guess was probably installed sometime in the 1930’s I would assume. It is a W.S. Darley traffic signal and they were produced in that era. I have another Darley signal. Plus another thats just for parts and pieces.

This signal was attached to 2 different building and was hung that way. I believe also, that this and the signal down the street were both controlled by the same controller too. I’d have to do a bit of investigating (ask some fellow collectors) if that was actually the case.

It was an odd looking signal. 10 of the 12 Darley visors had long tunnel type visors bolted onto them. Not sure if there was some kind of viability issues so I dont know why they would have added all the tunnels to this light. And why 2 of the yellows didnt have them is a mystery.

I wired this up to my Utica, NY GS controller from the 1940’s, had to add a few light bulbs that were missing and BINGO! All the bulbs worked and it was cycling just like it did for 50+ years at least.

A bunch of the visors dont come off at the moment. The bolts are really rusted on the latches. Thankfully all the bulbs worked except for the missing ones which took me a while to get those off to add the bulbs.

A few of the visors are broken and missing a latch. Hey, it’s old, and that happens I guess.

What i’ll do with this, probably leave it like this. I like them in off the street condition. I’ll replace the 69 watt clear bulbs with some LEDs providing I can get to all the bulbs. And i will probably let the Utica GS controller do it’s thing and run this light. 

Here’s a video of this light and the controller playing nice with each other. I just love the sloppiness of the controller and the occasional dark periods when it is changing phases. Classic old mechanical controller.