![]() ![]() It has a fusee and uses percussion caps (think toy cap pistols) on a cardboard disc to ignite a gasoline soaked fusee (a wick, if you please). The fusee was extinguished by covering it with a cap, denying the oxygen necessary to burn. Later versions used the fusee as a wick immersed in gasoline in a tank - the beginnings of the more modern flint and petrol lighter. In the early versions a gear system was used to turn a fire steel to produce sparks and ignite the fusee. A fusee (comes from 'fuse' as used on early cannons) is a cord impregnated with chemicals to assist it in burning - not quickly where a flame would be produced, but slowly and without an open flame. These safety matches got a lot of notice at the 1855 World Exhibition in Paris. ![]() The safety match separates the chemicals so the match must typically be struck against a special surface to ignite. Johan and younger brother Carl Frans started a production facility for safety matches and by the mid-to-late 1850s it was a thriving industry producing millions of boxes of safety matches - essentially the same safety match we use today that you have seen in matchbooks (which were introduced circa 1890) and the small match boxes. The "Safety Match" is invented by Gustaf Erik Pasch of Sweden and improved by Johan Edvard Lundstrom. It is still dangerous because, again, friction will ignite the match its greatest convenience is also its greatest weakness and danger. This is an improvement because the match lights more smoothly. Hungarian chemistry student Janos Irinyi invents the "Noiseless Match". It did have drawbacks as it was ignited by friction rubbing on any surface, occasionally would almost explode when lit, and could throw sparks off with the potential of lighting any surrounding combustible material. This is the first truly portable, easily used, readily available source of "instant fire". The friction match is invented by English chemist John Walker. Since the Dobereriner lighters produced hydrogen gas, they could also unexpectedly explode. Through the years this process forms the basis for many, many lighters including some very familiar to collectors such as Lektrolite and New Method lighters. It is a catalyst lighter that produces hydrogen gas which is ignited using platinum as a catalyst. Johann Wolfgang Dobereiner discovers the catalytic process resulting in the invention of Dobereiner's Lamp which was in production until circa 1880. Now, loosely speaking, lighters, a method of producing fire, were around in various forms long before this timeline starts this timeline is an attempt to trace the roots of the modern cigarette / cigar / pipe lighter, so it doesn't start with the Cave Man, but it does include matches. Here is a timeline in the development of lighters. This was not always the case, by any means. Lighters are ubiquitous, inexpensive, dependable, and available in myriad sizes, types, and styles. ![]() BACK to Index of Articles ~Click Any Image For Enlargement~ ![]()
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