ARTIFICIAL LIGHTING IN AMERICA — W ATKINS 401 



from backing into the fuel supply. It was exhibited at the New York 

 Crystal Palace Exposition in 1854 and was acclaimed by such notable 

 scientists of the day as Benjamin Silliman. Another, consisting of a 

 glass reservoir enclosing a metal lining, was patented by Prof. E. N. 

 Horsford, a Harvard archcologist, and James R. Nichols. 



Other improvements in the use of camphene and fluids were designed 

 to make the flame burn more brightly. One was patented by "Doctor" 

 Michael Boyd Dyott, a flamboyant Philadelphia manufacturer of 

 glass, patent medicines, and a burning fluid he called "pine oil." In 

 his lamp the fluid was vaporized and burned as a gas. This was fol- 

 lowed by several other designs which were in effect gas lamps using 

 vaporized fuel. 



The Franklin Institute's experiments of 1843, already several times 

 alluded to, led to the conclusion that "camphene possesses a remarkable 

 intensity and higher lighting power, with a brilliant white flame, and 

 from its cheapness presents strong claims, on the score of economy, 

 upon public notice. Its disadvantages are, the great inflammability 

 of the material, the liability to annoyance from its disagreeable smell, 

 and the injurious and unendurable smoke which proceeds from the 

 lamp when out of order, or not properly regulated" (1843, ser. 3, vol. 5, 

 p. 108 ff.). The brilliance attributed to camphene was, of course, a 

 matter of comparison and degree. To one used to the single-candle- 

 power light of a whale-oil burner the light from a fluid burner was a 

 vast improvement. That the fluids were widely adopted, both (we 

 may assume) on the basis of their "high lighting power" and "on the 

 score of economy," is evident from the large number of surviving 

 examples. 



To what extent the rural population, with its conservatism re- 

 enforced by a healthy fear of fire, may have taken up the burning 

 fluids is open to surmise. Certainly most country residents were pre- 

 pared to welcome a safer substitute than camphene for traditional 

 lighting devices. Such a substitute was provided by lard from their 

 own hogs, used in combination with any of the scores of newly in- 

 vented lard lamps. Most of the lamps designed for burning lard 

 were crude in appearance and bizarre in function. Few were based 

 on scientific knowledge, but almost all were concerned with over- 

 coming the difficulties of burning a semisolid fuel. There were three 

 basic principles employed in the lamps: (1) Conduction of heat from 

 the flame to the fuel supply; (2) gravity, usually in combination with 

 conduction devices; and (3) mechanical pressure. 



In 1830 Stephen P. Moorehead sought a patent on a lard lamp liav- 

 ing copper wires wound around the wick tubes and leading down into 

 the reservoir. Thus heat from the flame would, in theory, at least, 

 be carried down to the lard. Moorehead was not the originator of 



