Tyne and Wear HER(1605): West Monkseaton, Grange Park/Earsdon Road, Sewer Gas Lamp - Details
1605
N Tyneside
West Monkseaton, Grange Park/Earsdon Road, Sewer Gas Lamp
West Monkseaton
NZ37SW
Gardens Parks and Urban Spaces
Street Lamp
Gas Lamp
Modern
C20
Structure
Joseph Webb, a Birmingham man, invented a sewer lamp in the 1890s, primarily to destroy sewer smells and germs. Contrary to popular belief, however, these lamps do not burn sewer gas, but ordinary town gas. The updraught created by the flame's heat conducts the sewer gases up through the hollow column and over the three or four lighted mantles, where they are purified before being released into the atmosphere. 10 lamps survive in Whitley Bay and Monkseaton, most or all probably dating to between 1900 and 1910. The legend "The Webb Lamp Co. Ltd." is on the door plate of each example. LISTED GRADE 2
3375
7165
NZ33757165
<< HER 1605 >> P. Syder, 1973, Shedding light on a Victorian light shedder, Gas World, 22/29 December, 1973
T. Henderson, 1993, Lighting up for the way we were, The Journal, 15 December, 1993
I. Ayris, 1992, Sewer Gas Lamps in Whitley Bay and Monkseaton
Dept. of National Heritage, List of Buildings of Special ... Interest, 5/183