What are oil pots?
Oil pots are complete lamps that are intended to be inserts into a lamp body. During the late 1800’s and early 1900’s there was a large industry of companies making decorative hanging, table and floor lamp bodies that used standard size oil pots to provide the lighting. All the “gone with the wind” style glass lamps used oil pots to hold the kerosene. This allowed for many fanciful designs without worry of being kerosene tight or for oil refilling. The industry standard oil pot was 5 inches in diameter below the top rim, and 3/1/2 inches deep when measured from the bottom of the rim to the pot bottom. The pot sat inside it’s space and rested upon the pot’s top rim. Glass lamps usually had brass inserts that also supported the bottom of the oil pot to spread the weight over a larger area. At the least there was a metal rim upon which the rim of the oil pot rested. Making lamps that accepted oil pots was an inexpensive industry to get started in so there were a number of fly by night oil
