BTW, if you do visit one of the Warship Memorial/Museum, ask for and take what they call the "Hardhat Tour" after it's closed. It cost extra, but they'll take you to any part of the ship you want to go to, even the areas closed to the public. On the Texas, I spoke to all the tour guides the afternoon I visited and told of the lore of I-T-E Circuit Breakers being the only type allowed on armed vessels before WWII. This turned into a somewhat heated debate. Since none of the three tour guides had been Electrians Mates during their stints in the Navy, We all went to see if this were true. The USS Texas had its keel laid in 1912 and was commissioned in 1914, I believe. The main Electrical Board, housed in the forward-most compartment, directly above the forward fuel (diesel, you could smell it) compartment, had breakers and control devices mounted to a 3 inch thick panel of slate secured to the deck and braced to the hull. Mounted there were single pole breakers with nameplates bearing the manufacturer's name and equipment data:
J B Cutter Electric
Philadelphia Penna
Type L Circuit Breaker
50 Amps 250 Volts
Emlazoned across the live front frame were the trademark used since 1906 by Cutter:
I-T-E Circuit Breaker.
All brass and wrought iron. Phenolic, Bakelite and Slate being the insulation. It wasn't until the late twenties that steel frames began being used to make switchboards, and not until the late thirties that the slate back of the breakers were replaced by molded phenolic pieces set in steel frames became general practice. Alas, the company is no more, with Siemens owning the trademark since 1980. But I have the manuals on some of the breakers types and would just love to refurbish the entire board on the Texas. These breakers were made in the era when, in addition to overload protection built into them, they also included 'reverse current' protection also. What a thrill for me, as the earliest model of breaker I had seen and worked on before was made in 1925 and was still in service in Minneapolis. 1928 models still in service at the Bagnel Dam in Missouri are the next oldest, but these were replaced with new in 1996.
By the way, the old lore was wrong. There were Westinghouse breakers all over the ship.