Focus on Mid Century Lighting: Dazor, and the Model 2004 UFO Desk Lamp

Dazor began producing lighting products in the years before WWII drew the US into war. In 1938 Harry Dazey and Albert Perbal formed Dazor to manufacture task lighting products, including a design that Dazey had been working on that featured a spring-loaded "floating arm" design. Some of the first products produced by the company were floor lamps with complex spring-tension systems that allowed the lamps to be positioned where the user needed light, and without the need to loosen, tighten, and re-tighten thumb screws each and every time the light source needed to be re-positioned for work. The company's success boomed with the advent of WWII, not least of all because the US government found out that it could save a lot of money with Dazor lights by replacing the massive overhead lights that it had been using for assembly of items where focused lighting that the user could easily adjust the lighting angle and distance from the work piece was more important. During WWII, the US government was Dazor's biggest customer, and up to 165 employees worked in two shifts to fill orders for lamps. Dazor was also the first company to use fluorescent technology - in fact, GE featured Dazor's fluorescent offerings at the 1938 World's Fair in Columbus. Pretty impressive for a start-up.