Limelight and a Steam-Powered Coach

Sir Goldsworthy Gurney (1793-1875) of Cornwall first became a surgeon, chemist and lecturer but in 1823 decided to work full-time on his steam-powered coach. It carried 18 passengers and although in 1829 he successfully drove it on the road at 15mph maximum all the way to Bath from London and back (which took two days), it was subjected to unreasonably high tolls and regulated out of business through lobbying of the government by the horse-and-carriage fraternity.

The new steam railways also had advantages over it and the condition of roads was not really adequate.. Gurney was bankrupted, so he turned to other projects. He discovered that bright white limelight could be produced by pointing the very hot flame from an oxy-hydrogen blowpipe at quicklime. He developed this to light up theatre stages, the Houses of Parliament, Trafalgar Square and Bude Castle, where he lived. Indeed, one ‘Bude Light’ was enough to light all the rooms by means of a network of prisms and lenses.

His lighting system for the House of Commons remained in place for 60 years and he was also in charge of their heating and ventilation systems. Another invention, the Gurney stove, is still in use today at a handful of cathedrals.

(Images LtoR: Wellcome Collection at Wikimedia Commons / CC BY 4.0, ausdew at Flickr.com / Public domain & Blondinrikard Froberg at Wikimedia Commons / CC BY 2.0)