page_title: Gas lighting
section_title: Widespread use
hierarchical_section_title: Gas lighting / Widespread use
caption_attribution_description: English: Baltimore Gas Light
context_page_description: Gas lighting is production of artificial light from combustion of a gaseous fuel, such as hydrogen, methane, carbon monoxide, propane, butane, acetylene, ethylene, or natural gas.
  The light is produced either directly by the flame, generally by using special mixes of illuminating gas to increase brightness, or indirectly with other components such as the gas mantle or the limelight, with the gas primarily functioning as a fuel source.
  Before electricity became sufficiently widespread and economical to allow for general public use, gas was the most popular method of outdoor and indoor lighting in cities and suburbs. Early gas lights were ignited manually, but many later designs are self-igniting.
  Gas lighting now is generally used for camping, where the high energy density of a hydrocarbon fuel, combined with the modular nature of canisters allows bright and long lasting light to be produced cheaply and without complex equipment. In addition, some urban historical districts retain gas street lighting, and gas lighting is used indoors or outdoors to create or preserve a nostalgic effect.
context_section_description: Among the economic impacts of gas lighting was much longer work hours in factories. This was particularly important in Great Britain during the winter months when nights are significantly longer. Factories could even work continuously over 24 hours, resulting in increased production. Following successful commercialization, gas lighting spread to other countries.
  In England, the first place outside London to have gas lighting was Preston, Lancashire, in 1816; this was due to the Preston Gaslight Company run by revolutionary Joseph Dunn, who found the most improved way of brighter gas lighting. The parish church there was the first religious building to be lit by gas lighting.
  In America, Seth Bemis lit his factory with gas illumination from 1812 to 1813. The use of gas lights in Rembrandt Peale's Museum in Baltimore in 1816 was a great success. Baltimore was the first American city with gas street lights; Peale's Gas Light Company of Baltimore on February 7, 1817 lit its first street lamp at Market and Lemon Streets (currently Baltimore and Holliday Streets). The first private residence in the US illuminated by gas has been variously identified as that of David Melville (c. 1806), as described above, or of William Henry, a coppersmith, at 200 Lombard Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1816.
  In 1817, at the three stations of the Chartered Gas Company in London, 25 chaldrons (24 m³) of coal were carbonized daily, producing 300,000 cubic feet (8,500 m³) of gas. This supplied gas lamps equal to 75,000 Argand lamps each yielding the light of six candles. At the City Gas Works, in Dorset Street, Blackfriars, three chaldrons of coal were carbonized each day, providing the gas equivalent of 9,000 Argand lamps. So 28 chaldrons of coal were carbonized daily, and 84,000 lights supplied by those two companies only.
  At this period the principal difficulty in gas manufacture was purification. Mr. D. Wilson, of Dublin, patented a method for purifying coal-gas by means of the chemical action of ammoniacal gas. Another plan was devised by Reuben Phillips, of Exeter, who patented the purification of coal-gas by the use of dry lime. G. Holworthy, in 1818, patented a method of purifying it by passing the gas, in a highly condensed state, through iron retorts heated to a dark red.
  In 1820, Swedish inventor Johan Patrik Ljungström had developed a gas lighting with copper apparatuses and chandeliers of ink, brass and crystal, reportedly one of the first such public installations of gas lightning in the region, enhanced as a triumphal arch for the city gate for a royal visit of Charles XIV John of Sweden in 1820.
  By 1823, numerous towns and cities throughout Britain were lit by gas. Gas light cost up to 75% less than oil lamps or candles, which helped to accelerate its development and deployment. By 1859, gas lighting was to be found all over Britain and about a thousand gas works had sprung up to meet the demand for the new fuel. The brighter lighting which gas provided allowed people to read more easily and for longer. This helped to stimulate literacy and learning, speeding up the second Industrial Revolution.
  Oil-gas appeared in the field as a rival of coal-gas. In 1815, John Taylor patented an apparatus for the decomposition of "oil" and other animal substances. Public attention was attracted to "oil-gas" by the display of the patent apparatus at Apothecary's Hall, by Taylor & Martineau.
  In 1891 the gas mantle was invented by the Austrian chemist Carl Auer von Welsbach. This eliminated the need for special illuminating gas (a synthetic mixture of hydrogen and hydrocarbon gases produced by destructive distillation of bituminous coal or peat) to get bright shining flames. Acetylene was also used from about 1898 for gas lighting on a smaller scale.
  Illuminating gas was used for gas lighting, as it produces a much brighter light than natural gas or water gas. Illuminating gas was much less toxic than other forms of coal-gas, but less could be produced from a given quantity of coal. The experiments with distilling coal were described by John
caption: Baltimore first U.S. street gas light
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