QUARTER CENTURY OF ELECTRIC LIGHTING 155 



for so prodigious a growth and the factors which have gone 

 to produce it. 



In that quarter centurj^ the population of the country 

 has increased about 80 per cent, and few large industries have 

 exceeded this rate of growth ; but electric lighting, starting 

 from absolute nonexistence, has risen to an industry of first 

 rank in the face of strong competition from other illuminants, 

 and what is more, in the face of a cost which throughout its 

 whole early history was undeniably higher than that of any 

 other illuminant. It has made its way through the operation 

 of favoring factors other than economy, ranking as a luxury 

 rather than a necessity, and only within a few years being 

 able to meet competition on a simple basis of cost. These 

 facts are very unusual in the history of a great industry and 

 deserve careful consideration. They are the more extraor- 

 dinary w^hen one considers that for some years electric 

 Ughting was not only upon the whole the most costly but the 

 least reUable form of illumination, was fought viciously by 

 the fire under^vriters, suffered from ferocious internecine 

 war among its exponents, and had been a very Gettysburg 

 of patent litigation. 



When late in 1879 the incandescent lamp appeared as a 

 commercial possibility, the arc lamp had already been for 

 some years in slowly increasing use both here and abroad, 

 mostly for small private installations, for the quite sufficient 

 reason that the largest arc dynamos would handle but a few 

 lamps, not enough to cut any figure at all for anything but the 

 smallest plants. Nevertheless it was perfectly evident that 

 the arc had come to stay. It had the inestimable property 

 of giving white light in the form of a very intense and power- 

 ful unit. Before the electric arc came into use, lights of 

 similar power were practically nonexistant, and the arcs 

 could therefore give a brilliancy of effect hitherto unknown. 

 This fact of itself accounted for their rapid growth in popu- 

 larity and when their accurate rendition of color values is 

 taken into account, it is small wonder that they made a sensa- 

 tion. The Jablochkoff candle, practically the earUest com- 

 mercial form of arc, was, in spite of its limitations, altogether 

 remarkable in the quality of the illumination given, and, in 



