The Evening statesman. [volume] (Walla Walla, Wash.) 1903-1910, 1909-04-20
RARE METAL FOR LIGHTING.

One October night in the year 1881
while Washington's cannon were de-
handing the surrender of CORVALLIS at
! Yorktown, a German scientist, work
ing in his little laboratory by the light
from tallow candles, discovered a new
and most unusual metal which he
found impossible to melt in his char
coal furnace. He called the new metal
Tungsten, from the Swedish "tung
(neavy) and "sten" stone because the
heavy ores had come from Sweden
Little did the old man know, as he
worked away by candlelight to give his
discovery to the world. that his find
would one day, hundred and twenty
five years later, completely revolution
ize electric lighting.
Twenty five years ago Thomas A.
Edison produced the first successful
incandescent electric lamp after other
inventors had worked for nearly fifty
years to perfect the device. The fila
ments for Edison's first lamps were
made of carbonized strips of bamboo
heated white hot in a vacuum globe
by electricity. After 1894 carboniZed
cotton cellulose was used for the fila
ments and it seemed as though the
lamp had surely reached perfection.
The filaments of incandescent cleo
trio lamps were. made of carbon be-
cause no other material could be found
which would withstand the intense
heat Every well-known metal was
tried but melted before reaching the
required temperatures. Then the in
ventOrs began to experiment with the
more uncommon metals and again a
German scientist took up the study
of Tungsten.
At first the great trouble was TO
secure pure Tungsten. This diff
Guilty was overcome with the aid of an
electric furnace, but the product, in
the form of a gray, metallic powder,
proved so refractory that it could not
be melted into ingots or drawn out
into wire. An experimental filament
was made by mixing the fine powder
with a paste and squirting the mixture
through a die much the same as a
spider spins its web. This thread was
in turn heated in an electric furnace
form of fine wire. With the melt
ing point of Tungsten so much high
err than any other known metal it was
possible to heat the filament to greater
incandescence producing more and
better light with less waste of cur
rent in useless heat.
Then the electrical inventors awoke
to the fact that the very substance
they were seeking, that which Edison
had secured the world to find, lay un-
der their hand all the time, and Tung-
stem, useless and practically unknown
| for over a century, came into it's own
| and began the wonderful task of xevo-
! lutionizing incandescent electric light
| ing.
The advent of the new Tungsten
! lamp was startling to the users OF
! electricity for lighting purposes, fol
| they saw at once that the new lamps
would easily give the same light as the
| common incandescent lamps for one
| third the cost A home that was light
! ed by electricity for 1925 month
could be lighted with the new lamp:
/ for seventy-eight cents. Not only that
!
lamps proved to be pure white, very
nearly akin to actual sunshine, soft
pleasing and beneficial to the eyes, ant
not of a yellow cast like the common
incandescent lamps.
The new Tungsten lamps will replace
those now in use without special fix
/ lures; in fact, any sixteen candlepowel
| incandescent lamp can be replaced will
thirty-two candlepower Tungsten
which will give twice. the light ant
save twenty per cent of the cost. Th,
new lamps are the same as the ole
! in size, shape and general appearance
the difference being in the light giving
filament within the glass bulb.