First Texas Artificial Gas Plant
Jefferson, Marion County, Texas
Marker Inscription
(5 blocks east) Jefferson Gas Light Company, chartered 1870 for public and domestic service, used retorts-- 7 foot iron drums with small necks-- to make illuminating gas. (One retort stood on this site.) Loaded with pine knots and rich pine wood, a retort was heated; its gas was forced into mains by use of a pressure drum. Street lights on hollow posts, 300 feet apart, were 10-candle glass globes, lighted by a man on a ladder. These and gaslights in houses gave Jefferson-- then largest inland port and second largest city in Texas-- the state's first gaslight system. (1966)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Chartered in 1870, the Jefferson Gas Light Company made illuminating gas by loading iron retorts with pine knots and rich pinewood, heating them, and forcing the gas through mains under pressure. Street lamps on hollow posts set 300 feet apart—ten-candle glass globes lit by a man on a ladder—together with household gaslights gave Jefferson the state's first gaslight system. At the time Jefferson was Texas's largest inland port and second-largest city.
Why it matters
Before electricity, manufactured gas lit the nation's growing cities, and Jefferson's pioneering system marks Texas's entry into that modern urban age.
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Themes & tags
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