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Pope was founded on March 27, 1889, as Emile Goossens, Pope & van der Kaa. Driving force was the British engineer Frederic Pope. After WWI, they appeared as N V Pope's Draad- en Lampenfabrieken.
The Deutsche Pope-Lampen A G, Adalbertsteinweg 232, Aachen (Germany) was a German subsidiary founded in ca. 1910, with production starting in 1912.
Frederic Pope returned to England in 1905 where he founded the Pope Electric Lamp Co Ltd in London (brand name Elasta). This company was bought by GEC in 1934 who continued the use of the brand.
Pope's used two brands for their incandescent lamps: Pope and Condor. Condor was an export brand and was sold mainly to countries in the British Empire. The only tubes Pope's ever produced in their own facilities were Bal branded tubes.
At the end of 1919, the British shareholders F R Pope and M W O'Connell sold their shares of Pope's to Philips. Philips successively turned Pope's into a cable and wire factory. The last incandescent lamps were produced by Pope's in 1927 - Philips however continued to use both the Pope and Condor brand for light bulbs.
Condor and Pope branded tubes were made in Philips factories. They have a type designation beginning with PR and are identical except for the fact that Condor tubes often had American bases.
The first Pope tube was advertised in the magazine Radio Nieuws of November 1st, 1920. Between 1925 and 1935 there is little information about the brand, but from 1935 onwards, with the establishment of the European type designation system, Pope was used as a second tube brand of Philips. The trademark Pope remained in the hand of Pope's.
Reference: Radiomuseum 3002
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