For the first 40 plus years of its existence, the Capitol was lit by candles and whale-oil lamps, including an absolute monster of a chandelier that had briefly hung in the House chamber. Its almost immediate destruction gave Congress the idea that a new way of lighting their workspace was needed. Fortunately, there was, as there so often is, someone with an idea.
His name was James Crutchett, and he was born in England in 1816. In the early 1840s, he patented a new of manufacturing gas, and then for reasons unknown, decided to move to the United States. He was mainly active in the Midwest, including filing a patent for his system while living in Cincinnati.
In 1845, Crutchett moved to Washington, buying a house just north of the Capitol. He fitted it out with a gas plant and succeeded in making his house the first private house illuminated by gas in Washington.
The gas production was described in a November, 1847, article in the Washington Daily Union:
It produces crude gas rapidly from the commonest crude oil of animals, mineral, or vegetable substances affording it. Thus, common whale oil, or foot, cottonseed-oil, &c. – grease from any source – supply the material. On passing through the cylinders, which are heated to redness, all impurities other than carburetted hydrogen are separated in the most simple manner, and fitted for transit into the gas-holder, where the gas passes by virtue of the pressure under which it is generated.
From here, he branched out, selling his system to a local hotel.
His real prize was the Capitol, however, and in January 1847, he contacted Congress and suggested they use his system to light up their building – as well as the grounds around it. Two months later, Congress appropriated the money to add gas lighting to the Capitol, but with a caveat – Crutchett has to prove himself first. He chose the most outrageous way of doing it – by building a 92-foot mast on the top of the Capitol dome with a light at the top that would light up the whole Capitol grounds.
Unsurprisingly, Congress was skeptical. They asked Benjamin Brown French, Clerk of the House or Representatives, to inspect the plans, and to see that adding this mast would not damage the dome. French (that’s him, above) pulled in Joseph Henry (of the Smithsonian) Robert Mills (architect of the Washington Monument) and William Renwick (who had designed the Smithsonian Castle)
All experts agreed that the mast would not be a problem, and so the work began, sourcing the pole from Pennsylvania, while the lantern for the top was made locally. Meanwhile, a new gas plant was built just northwest of the Capitol. It was described by the Daily Union:
The water-tank, receiving the gas-holder, being surmounted with a beautiful massive granite stone, (curbstone,) having six iron pillars around it, supporting a cornice, all bronzed – giving it a neat finish, and making it an ornament to that part of the Capitol heretofore the repository of coal, wood, &c.
Sadly, picture of this ‘ornament’ exists, just this rather opaque description.
Next week: The lantern above the Capitol.