gaslight burner types before 1890



Oak Hill Cottage was built c. 1847 but is restored to the 1870s because of the extant furnishings of the period passed down from the Dr. Jones family.  I have an interest in the authenticity of the lighting in the cottage; that it should represent the quality and level of light from the available gaslights of that time

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You will see the use of a droplight pendant, one of two found at Oak Hill, in this video.  This is an accessory tube that fits on a gasolier burner and brings a gaslight down to reading level.  Such droplights were shown in a few old fixture catalogs, but I have yet to see one in use in a period photograph. 

 

In the video you will see each of three burner types in use: the fishtail, the Argand, and a single jet.  The National Park Service book Gaslighting in America states that the most light output of a burner such as these prior to the development of the incandescent mantle gaslight in 1890 was about 10 to 15 watt electric bulb equivalent.



 

 

Part 2 of the Bentley Runyan post

http://www.clevelandareahistory.com/ posted part 2, and a part 3 is promised!

Bentley Runyan House mystery

A history blog out of Cleveland has highlighted this 1857 painting of the Bentley Runyan family in front of their Mansfield home.  By artist Frederick Elmore Cohen, the painting is in the Allen Memorial Museum at Oberlin, OH.  Christopher Busta-Peck has published Part 1 of a two part article about the painting on his Cleveland Area History page http://www.clevelandareahistory.com/2012/12/in-search-of-bright-green-house-bentley.html with part 2 promised shortly. 
The painting immediately struck me as similar or identical to one I had seen in the Richland County Museum in Lexington.  The painting I saw there, I understood to be of an unkown family and house in Mansfield.  I've recieved confirmation now that it is the "same" painting, but I have yet to recieve an answer of how that can be...whether two paintings were made, or a copy made and displayed in Lexington, or other explanation. 
So disregarding this perplexing aspect, I highly recommend reading the article and learning some newly uncovered Mansfield history.