El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1917-05-09
TH|MBLE FIRST
BURNER Of GAS
This is "Gas Week." Cele-
brating First Use For
Light and Heat.

In connection with Gas Range
week. which is being observed ma
tionally this week by gas companies
and gas range dealers. it is timely to
trace the growth of gas range cook
ing.
The first authentic recorded use of
gas for cooking was in 1880, when
James Sharp. Of Northampton, Eng,
constructed gas cooking apparatus
for the kitchen of his home. A couple
of years later, John Barlow, of Lon
don. made a gas range in his home
which was said to work splendidly.
These two plants excited so much in
terest that inventions for cooking and
heating by gas became numerous.
In 1850. the original gas range man,
James Sharp, delivered a lecture on
"GastronOmy." presenting the results
of his 20 years experience with gas
cooking In the same year. Soyer, a
famous French chef. constructed a
special appliance in which he roasted
meats with gas for big banquet. In
1851. Alexander Graham. a hotel pro-
prietOr of Glasgow, made and sold a
limited number OF gas cooking ovens
for hotels. Up to this time gas cook
ing had not entered the domestic
field.
Just 100 years ago. in Baltimore,
the first American gas company was
started, but it was not until 1853 that
gas ranges became 2 factor in the gas
business The Cincinnati Gazette,
during August, 1850, announced that
100 families are cooking with diff
ferent kinds of gas stoves-at an es-
timated consumption of 10 cubic feet
In 1864 the manufacture of gas
ranges in quantities started at Phil
adelphia- In 1879. the first gas range
to approach the modern type was
turned out in the same city At that
time the American gas ranges were
chiefly imported from England and
France
Worlds First Gas Burner.
It is said that a needle punctured
thimble gave the world its first gas
burner The idea was suggested to
William Murdoch, whose little cot
tage in Redruth, CORVALLIS, Eng,
became famous as the cradle of gas
lighting" according to the New York
Post Murdock's first experiments at
generating gas were made in a teapot,
later using large kettle for distill-
ing the coal.
Murdock first burned his gas sim
ply as flame from the end of the gas
pipe, and when he wanted to cut off
the gas. his method was extremely
simple
AAAA5 GAAl1~AA pug u EAdJ. MUIR
dock rammed it into the end of the
pipe.
He looked around one day for his
plug of clay to cut off the light, but
unfortunately that plug Of clay had
rolled under the table Unable to
find the plug, Murdoch hurriedly
looked around for something else and
found his wife's thimble-
Selling the thimble, Murdoch
rammed it over the end Of the pipe
a thOughtless sort of thing a brutal
man would debut, smelling the gas,
Murdoch applied a light and saw that
the c0imble was in the condition that
every good housewives thimble
should be II was full of small holes.
drilled by the unsymuathetic heads of
darning needles. and the gas escap-
ing through these small holes ignited,
and 10, his establishment Murdoch saw
that those two or three small Jets of
gas gave greater illumination than
5efSre had been given from the great
flare out of the pipe.
Working on that idea. Murdoch in
troduced the cockspur burner