The future looks dim for the incandescent bulb.



New federal power efficiency guidelines are set to take effect in 2012. Current incandescent technology doesn't meet the new standards, leaving compact fluorescent and LED lighting as the likely options for consumers. An outright ban of incandescent bulbs has already taken effect in Europe.



When the last traditional light bulbs go dark, however, so too will part of Polk County's history: the soft-white light bulb.



Commercially viable light bulbs had been around for 40 years when Mulberry native Marvin Pipkin joined General Electric in 1919. Just 30 years old, the World War I veteran was already a successful inventor who had created the charcoal filter used in gas masks.



Light bulbs of the time were made of clear glass and produced a harsh, glaring light. Numerous techniques had been tried to diffuse the light, including etching the outside of the glass or coating the inside, but nothing worked. Many researchers had given up.



Supposedly, the assignment to invent a frosted bulb was therefore given to Pipkin as a joke - a hazing ritual for new GE employees. Pipkin, however, took it seriously.



"When I was fussing around with inside frosting experiments, back in 1919, everybody laughed at me, and kept calling me off to tackle something 'more practical,'" Pipkin told Popular Science magazine in August 1927. "They told me about the manufacturer who had contracted with the railroads to supply 50,000 inside frosted bulbs, and had begged off on his contract when he found he had 50 percent breakage in his product. Inside frosting was an exploded dream."



The acids most researchers used to etch the inside of the bulb left the bulb too brittle for use. Pipkin continued experimenting with various acids, however, in hopes he could find the right formula. He claimed that, thanks to an annoying phone call, he did.



"One day I had just poured a cleaning solution into a (acid-etched) lamp on my desk when a telephone call interrupted me," Pipkin told Popular Science. "In answering the phone I accidentally tipped the bulb over and spilled the acid out before it had had time to clean off the inside etching.



"Later, when I returned to my experiment, I was careless enough to drop this inside-frosted and half-cleaned bulb onto the floor," he said. "By all rights it should have smashed to pieces. Even a clear glass bulb might not have stood the drop. But this theoretically very fragile inside-frosted bulb just bumped on the floor and rolled under the desk unhurt. And that's all there was to my discovery."



Pipkin continued improving light bulbs throughout his 36-year career at GE. Almost 25 years after he first frosted light bulbs, he used a silica-based substance to create an even better coated bulb that we know as the soft-white bulb. He also took part in creating photo flash bulbs.



"The next time you flick on a light switch, say a little prayer - if you're the praying kind - for Marvin Pipkin," The Ledger stated in a 1977 obituary. "He gave us better light, in his own humble way."



That is, until the lights go out.



[ Cinnamon Bair, a Polk County native, can be reached at cinbair@hotmail.com. ]