Jacquie wrote me, all excited after the retro decorating gods delivered this lovely vintage brown GE stove unto her. Its color is exactly the same as the cooktop and oven original to her house, so she is thrilled to have the matchy matchy magic goin’ on in her kitchen. Oops: Well, she still needs the fridge…. Meanwhile, she wants to know: What is the name of this color? Yo no lo se, but I do know that we have some GE-expert readers… Patrick? … so perhaps you can help Jacquie out with this question, and any other tidbits?
Oh, and meanwhile, I spot the cabinets (above) – same color! – in a time capsule house. Working on permission to feature more photos from that…
Click on first thumbnail to start slide show:
Here’s Jacquie’s story…. She writes:
I am baffled trying to find a vintage GE range color name and it is driving me crazy…maybe you can help.
We live in a late ’59, early 60’s built home,…plaster walls, block, and I do have a lot of little gems to share with you….like a radiant heater in the ceiling that we used this winter for the first time. (We bought the house in April 2009), so I have only been here for a year, but we have done quite a bit, and there is more to do all the time, I am sure you know that!!
I have the full size range now, the counter cooktop, and the eye-level oven all the same brown color, and it is not coppertone. It is more like a chocolate cocoa color???
I am very fortunate…the cooktop with the pushbuttons and the eye-level oven were in the house when we bought it…Real Estate agents kept apologizing for the “old kitchen” and no updates…( Like we cared…Ha!)
The bigger free-standing stove came just last week after I saw an ad on CL here in Mesa AZ from a man who had taken it out of a woman’s house in the downtown area …she had changed from electric to gas. (He told me these things when I called him!) She even cooked breakfast on the stove for them before they renovated her kitchen. She just wanted it out, so he took it home and garaged it, then posted the ad.
I’ve searched daily for a vintage free-standing stove,…just wanted one to ad to the kitchen….but I can’t even tell you how I about jumped out of my skin when I saw this old girl, and it matched my others. It was $150 delivered!! My husband, Glen, said “Get it Honey, before someone else does!!” We spent the entire evening removing things and rearranging the kitchen to accommodate, but once it is ready to use and the power is on, I am going to have soooo much more storage…I can’t wait to be able to use the drawers, and free up my cabinets. For now we have had to move the refrigerator into our dining area, so it made things look a little out of sync, but we can deal!! I cleaned mostly dust off her and a little grease, but nothing major, and the oven door feels like it has never been opened…the spring is very tight. It is in beautiful shape. “Babe” is being powered up on Friday this week, I have to run another 220, and a 35 amp breaker…. older home bugaboos that we take in stride!! Here is her portrait, and thanks for the help! (and her other 2 relatives, all at home in my kitchen!)
The man who sold it to me also threw in a hood, it is a “Ranger” needs lots of cleaning, haven’t started that yet, but I would like to put it over the stove if possible. Not so sure of the year of the stove, but with the color the same as is in my house, there can’t be much of a difference ..possibly 1959-1960? I would LOVE to find a matching FRIDGE!!! Maybe I will be blessed and find one someday.
That color…it is different, don’t you think?
You will be happy to know that my husband and I have gotten mostly everything from auctions, ads on Craigslist, and Re-store or Stardust Building Supply here in the valley of the sun.
Thank you for being attentive and helping all who will listen to have the foresight to “recycle” the right way…this history is to be cherished and protected.
Your Vintage lovin’ friend,
Jacquie
I love the color, Jacquie, and it is so cool that you have the growing and near-complete set. GE Friends, what do you think? What’s the name of this classic appliance color?
Gayla says
The color is cocoa brown. I have the cooktop and wall oven….
Donna S says
We bought a 1961 house from the original owner in 2010. She still had all her original GE appliances except for the dishwasher. Top refrigerator with bottom freezer and double ovens in woodtone brown with matching cabinets. Stovetop was stainless with a pushbutton control panel above the wall. It had a burner with a brain. Unfortunately it went brain dead and we replaced it with a smoothtop. Wish I bought a coil cooktop! That smoothtop is a pain. We kept the pushbutton controls on he wall because we didn’t have any extra matching tiles (orange and white). Unfortunately neither did World of Tile. It at least keeps the retro feel to the kitchen. While the fridge still worked the plastic liner was cracked in several places inside. And those old fridges just suck down electricity! If I could get new woodtone brown appliances now I’d buy them in a minute!
pam kueber says
Just to add: Not all old fridges are energy hogs. Depends on the features.
Nancy says
I have a brown cooktop with the controls in the wall that works and I am planning to replace it in the near future. Not sure of the color name but I know it is not copper tone.
Cindy J says
We have the same cooktop, double oven (wall), and refrigerator. The dishwasher quit about 4 years ago. Our kitchen was known to the neighorhood kids as the chocolate house.
Joe Felice says
The GE color is not copper or coppertone. Coppertone was a little different, and it was darker around the edges, fading to a lighter shade in the middle.
BTW, was there ANYTHING GE didn’t make in those days? That must have been one amazing company!
Kathy Findlay says
My parents bought a new home in Parma, Ohio in 1962. They had a built-in, brown stove top. I remember my mom calling the color “Coppertone.” I don’t know the make, and since Mom has passed, I can’t ask her. I am looking to sell my “Touch -n- Cook” Frigidaire poppy colored stove. For that era, it has incredible features, such as setting the time and oven, so that the meal would be cooked by a certain time! I was told by a service repair man, that it was one of only three ever made. We bought it in the early 1970s. It’s in mint condition. The oven is even self-cleaning! The corningware cooktop is in better condition than my current Frigidaire cooktop stove that we had installed in our new home in 2004. I take very good care of my possessions, therefore, I never cook on a dirty stove top surface. My new glass cooktop has a permanent light brown ring around the burner that I use most. I still LOVE that ol’ poppy stove, and hate to part with it, but I’ve moved it around from house-to-house, having a 220 line installed in each, but have yet to use it, since the early 1990s. It has a glass touch panel, that is a dream to clean! We had paid a smidgeon under $1,000 at the time of purchase. Since it’s still in grand shape, I plan on selling it for $700 firm. Not only was the color rare, but the fact that only three (3) of them were ever manufactured is a collector’s item for sure! It’s fun to see that the poppy color has returned with pots and pans now being sold in the poppy color, as well as small appliances. In closing, we also had the poppy colored, side-by-side refrigerator, however, it went to “Appliance Heaven,” after some 25-years of service. We had a repairman take a look at it, and because the parts were no longer available, he was unable to repair it. His parting comment was: “You’ll never see an appliance last this long anymore!!!!” If anyone is interested in purchasing my stove, please contact me at ktfindlay@roadrunner.com.
pam kueber says
Kathy, we actually have a Forum for buying/selling, you can post there — https://retrorenovation.com/forums/
David Izenman says
I looked all over the Valley to find a beautiful Sears 1960 Coldspot refrigerator only to have Edison give me a brand new white energy efficient one.
I am restoring a MCM prototype double wide 1965 I found in Palm Springs. It’s an over 55 park (who new is live this long). It was recently published with a picture in the latest Atomic Ranch MCM Magazine. What a thrill. Now I’m collecting metal kitchen cabinets with the double farm sink with drain boards. I’ve been reading all about Youngstown and I have someone to powder coat the cabinets but the guy who does porcelain coating is in Indiana. . It might cost more for shipping then re coating
Perhaps a reader might have some info for me
Dana says
I still have a GE Cadet Blue wall oven and wonder if they made the cooktop in that color. Still have a GE push button panel to a phantom GE cooktop. Oven getting worn but still works. Would like to replace clock timer and enameled interior. Love the deep blue color and want to keep it.
pam kueber says
Dana, see my category Kitchens/Appliances. I have a story there on places that can help you with parts for this.
Janet LaPointe says
Just realized I made an error; my bad memory thrives! The TV show with the Flame Red fridge was Bea Arthur’s earlier show “Maude”. That fridge had a radio in the door, if I remember right, and must have been a really high end appliance back in the mid seventies. Janet
Janet LaPointe says
My father was a GE dealer from 1953 until he died in 2000, when he was just about the oldest GE dealer in New England. I still have all the huge parts manuals, very heavy books, listing all the models, colors, and the parts needed. Woodtone Brown is correct and it didn’t sell well and didn’t last long. They even made a bright red for a year, maybe two, before that was discontinued due to poor sales. I remember GE would sponsor cooking shows in the late fifties and early sixties, promoting their products, and we gave away one of these red stoves, probably because they weren’t selling and GE wanted to get rid of them! The Coppertone came out when the woodtone brown, which I personally loved, was dropped, and it did quite well for many years. There is actually a GE 39″ woodtone brown stove on Craig’s List right now in East Nashville, for $800. If I lived closer, I would grab that in a sec – it looks beautiful and clean. Incidently, I also have a sales brochure on the wall fridges that are often seen with the GE metal cabinets which my father also sold and installed. If anyone is desperate for the parts info numbers, I may be able to look them up. One great thing about GE is that alot of the burners and oven coils were still available forty years later. We had parts from the fifties on our shelves! At one time around 1995, we still had a push button through-the-wall control panel for a cooktop, a woodtone brown cooktop, and a push button harvest gold hood. I don’t know where it all went after I left the business, but sure wish I had taken it all home when I did!
pam kueber says
Hi Janet, thanks for all this great info. The red was called Poppy, I think.
Janet LaPointe says
Pam, Poppy does ring a bell! I was thinking Flame but that may have been someone else. On the older Golden Girls episodes, there is a bright red fridge which I think is a Fridgidaire and that might have been where I am geting the flame. I need to find those manuals. Alot of my stuff is lost in space in the basement since we moved eight years ago! I also had an old sales book from the sixties with photos of pink fridges and turquoise stoves (and the Partio cart) and such! I don’t know where that went either! I noticed some comments on the coppertone and the harvest gold and avocado too. When they first came out, the colors were shaded around the edges. In the mid to late eighties, the coppertone and the harvest gold lost this shading and they were produced in a solid color. I forget now but I think they were just called Copper and Gold at that point but I don’t remember alot of stuff any more and would have to double check that. GE also made what I considered a beautiful color called SAND in the mid eighties which was so complimentary to all the natural colors back then but it didn’t sell well, nor did the silver, so they dropped them after maybe a year or eighteen months. To me they were both ahead of their time. When I see the old turquoise and yellow and pink appliances and cabinets, I can build a kitchen around them! Janet
napavelka says
I have the woodtone oven and cooktop with push buttons. Both work and in go canonod condition. In my cabin. Will replace one DAY
.
Clark Baughan says
HI Janet,
i’m restoring a 1970 GE P7 Model J470 Serial# S/L262330
Having trouble locating comprehensive parts index and no luck in finding service/repair info later than ’66
Any change your father’s tech library would reference this?
I could send a picture as needed.
Thanks so much!!
CB
pam kueber says
Clark, I suggest you contact The Old Appliance Club, they reportedly have helped a lot of people. See: https://retrorenovation.com/2011/08/29/parts-service-and-advice-to-fix-old-stoves-and-other-vintage-appliances-a-list-of-9-online-resources/
donna thomas says
hi, funny i was just talking to my girlfriend tonight about vintage colors in kitchens. i jus got a vintage pink oven identical to this.
the color is COPPERTONE BROWN
hugs donna 🙂
pam kueber says
hugs back at ya
Dani says
oh, and by the way, it *is* Woodland Brown.
http://mcmleague.org/?page_id=100