From the history of the creation of the electric flashlight. History of the street lamp, features of its occurrence When the flashlight was invented

According to history, the first attempts to use artificial lighting on urban streets date back to the beginning of the 15th century.

Back in 1417, the mayor of London, Henry Barton, ordered the hanging street lamps winter evenings. He took this step in order to dispel the impenetrable darkness in the British capital. The French decided not to lag behind and after some time they took up his initiative.

Baselona Gaudi lanterns

At the very beginning of the 16th century, every resident of the French capital was required to keep lamps near the windows that face the street. It was under Louis XIV that Paris was filled with the lights of numerous lanterns. In 1667, he issued a decree on street lighting, for which he received the nickname “Sun King”. According to legend, it was thanks to this decree that Louis’s reign was called brilliant.

Venice

The first street lamps provided relatively little light because they used ordinary candles and oil. Later, when kerosene began to be used, the brightness of lighting was significantly increased, but the real revolution in street light happened only at the beginning of the 19th century, when gas lamps appeared. They were invented by the English inventor William Murdoch. Naturally, at first he was ridiculed.
Voronezh

Walter Scott himself wrote to one of his friends that some madman was proposing to illuminate London with smoke. These ridicule did not stop Murdoch from bringing his idea to life and he successfully demonstrated the advantages of gas lighting.

Germany

In 1807, lanterns of a new design were installed on Pall Mall and soon conquered all European capitals. In Russia, street lighting appeared under Peter I.

Egypt

In 1706, he ordered lanterns to be hung on the facades of some houses near the Peter and Paul Fortress to celebrate the victory over the Swedes near Kalisz.

Kyiv This chandelier serves as a street lamp near a cafe

In 1718, the first stationary lamps appeared on the streets of St. Petersburg, and 12 years later, Empress Anna Ioannovna ordered their installation in Moscow.

China

The history of electric lighting is associated primarily with the names of the Russian inventor Alexander Lodygin and the American Thomas Edison.

Lviv

In 1873, Lodygin designed a carbon incandescent lamp, for which he received the Lomonosov Prize from the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. Such lamps were soon used to illuminate the St. Petersburg Admiralty. A few years later, Edison demonstrated an improved light bulb - brighter and cheaper to produce.

Moscow

With its appearance, gas lamps quickly disappeared from city streets, giving way to electric ones.

Budapest

In Bryansk

Venice

Venna

Dubrovnik

Egg Castle Bavaria Alps

Zichron Yaakov 19th century

Spain

China city Shenzhen

Kronstadt

London

Lviv

Moscow

Over Damascus

Odessa

Paris

Shevchenko Park Kyiv

Peter

Turtle area Siena

Rome

Talin

Look around, the world is still full of beautiful things...

People made an attempt to illuminate the streets at the beginning of the 15th century. London Mayor Henry Barton was the first to take this initiative. By his order, lanterns appeared on the streets of the British capital in winter to help navigate in the impenetrable darkness. After some time, the French also made an attempt to illuminate the city streets. At the beginning of the 16th century, to illuminate the streets of Paris, residents were required to install lighting lamps on their windows. In 1667, Louis XIV issued a decree on street lighting. As a result, the streets of Paris were illuminated with many lanterns, and the reign of Louis XIV was called brilliant.

The first street lights in history used candles and oil, so the lighting was dim. Over time, the use of kerosene in them made it possible to slightly increase the brightness, but this was still not enough. At the beginning of the 19th century, gas lamps began to be used, which significantly improved the quality of lighting. The idea to use gas in them belonged to the English inventor William Murdoch. At the time, few people took Murdoch's invention seriously. Some even considered him crazy, but he was able to prove that gas lamps have many advantages. The first gas lamps in history appeared in 1807 on Pall Mall. Soon the capital of almost every European state could boast of the same lighting.

As for Russia, street lighting appeared here thanks to Peter I. In 1706, the emperor, celebrating the victory over the Swedes near Kalisz, ordered lanterns to be hung on the facades of houses around the Peter and Paul Fortress. Twelve years later, lanterns illuminated the streets of St. Petersburg. They were installed on Moscow streets on the initiative of Empress Anna Ioannovna.

A truly incredible event was the invention of electric lighting. The world's first incandescent lamp was created by Russian electrical engineer Alexander Lodygin. For this he was awarded the Lomonosov Prize of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. A few years later, American Thomas Edison introduced a light bulb that provided better illumination and was also inexpensive to produce. Undoubtedly, this invention displaced gas lamps from city streets.

In 1417, the mayor of London, Henry Barton, ordered lanterns to be hung on winter evenings to dispel the impenetrable darkness in the British capital. After some time, the French took up his initiative. At the beginning of the 16th century, residents of Paris were required to keep lamps near windows that faced the street. Under Louis XIV, the French capital was filled with the lights of numerous lanterns. The Sun King issued a special decree on street lighting in 1667. According to legend, it was thanks to this decree that Louis’s reign was called brilliant.

The first street lamps provided relatively little light because they used ordinary candles and oil. The use of kerosene made it possible to significantly increase the brightness of lighting, but the real revolution in street light occurred only at the beginning of the 19th century, when gas lamps appeared. Their inventor, the Englishman William Murdoch, was initially ridiculed. Walter Scott wrote to one of his friends that some madman was proposing to illuminate London with smoke. Despite such criticisms, Murdoch successfully demonstrated the advantages of gas lighting. In 1807, lanterns of a new design were installed on Pall Mall and soon conquered all European capitals.

St. Petersburg became the first city in Russia where street lights appeared. On December 4, 1706, on the day of celebrating the victory over the Swedes, on the orders of Peter I, street lamps were hung on the facades of the streets facing the Peter and Paul Fortress. The Tsar and the townspeople liked the innovation, the lanterns began to be lit on all major holidays, and thus the beginning of street lighting in St. Petersburg was laid. In 1718, Tsar Peter I issued a Decree on “lighting the streets of the city of St. Petersburg” (the decree on lighting the Mother See was signed by Empress Anna Ioannovna only in 1730). The design of the first street oil lantern was designed by Jean Baptiste Leblond, an architect and “skilled technician of many different arts, of great importance in France.” In the autumn of 1720, 4 striped beauties, made at the Yamburg glass factory, were exhibited on the Neva embankment near the Peter the Great's Winter Palace. Glass lamps were mounted on metal rods on wooden posts with white and blue stripes. Hemp oil burned in them. This is how we got regular street lighting.

In 1723, thanks to the efforts of Chief of Police General Anton Divier, 595 lanterns were lit on the most famous streets of the city. This lighting facility was served by 64 lamplighters. The approach to the matter was scientific. The lanterns were lit from August to April, guided by the “tables of the dark hours” that were sent from the Academy.

St. Petersburg historian I.G. Georgi describes this lighting on the streets as follows: “For this purpose, there are wooden pillars painted blue and white along the streets, each of which on an iron rod supports a spherical lantern, lowered on a block for cleaning and pouring oil...”

St. Petersburg was the first city in Russia and one of the few in Europe where regular street lighting appeared just twenty years after its founding. Oil lanterns turned out to be tenacious - they burned in the city every day for 130 years. Frankly speaking, there was not much light from them. In addition, they tried to splash passers-by with hot drops of oil. “Further, for God’s sake, further from the lantern!” - we read in Gogol’s story Nevsky Prospekt, “and quickly, as quickly as possible, pass by. It’s even luckier if you get away with him pouring stinking oil all over your smart frock coat.”

Lighting the northern capital was a profitable business, and merchants were willing to do it. They received a bonus for each burning lantern and therefore the number of lanterns in the city began to increase. So, by 1794, there were already 3,400 lanterns in the city, much more than in any European capital. Moreover, the St. Petersburg lanterns (in the design of which such famous architects as Rastrelli, Felten, Montferrand took part) were considered the most beautiful in the world.

The lighting was not perfect. At all times there have been complaints about the quality of street lighting. The lights shine dimly, sometimes they don’t light up at all, they are turned off ahead of time. There was even an opinion that lamplighters saved their oil for porridge.

For decades, oil was burned in lanterns. Entrepreneurs realized the profitability of lighting and began to look for new ways to generate income. From ser. 18th century Kerosene began to be used in lanterns. In 1770, the first lantern team of 100 people was created. (recruits), in 1808 she was assigned to the police. In 1819 on Aptekarsky Island. Gas lamps appeared, and in 1835 the St. Petersburg Gas Lighting Society was created. Spirit lamps appeared in 1849. The city was divided between various companies. Of course, it would be reasonable, for example, to replace kerosene lighting with gas lighting everywhere. But this was not profitable for oil companies, and the outskirts of the city continued to be illuminated with kerosene, since it was not profitable for the authorities to spend a lot of money on gas. But for a long time in the evenings, lamplighters with ladders on their shoulders loomed on the city streets, hastily running from lamppost to lamplight.

A textbook on arithmetic has been published in more than one edition, where the problem was given: “A lamplighter lights lamps on a city street, running from one panel to another. The length of the street is a verst three hundred fathoms, the width is twenty fathoms, the distance between adjacent lamps is forty fathoms, the speed of the lamplighter is twenty fathoms per minute. The question is, how long will it take him to complete his work?” (Answer: 64 lamps located on this street can be lit by a lamplighter in 88 minutes.)

But then the summer of 1873 arrived. An emergency announcement was made in a number of metropolitan newspapers that “on July 11, experiments in electric street lighting will be shown to the public along Odesskaya Street, on Peski.”

Recalling this event, one of its eyewitnesses wrote: “... I don’t remember from what sources, probably from newspapers, I learned that on such and such a day, at such and such an hour, somewhere on Peski, they would be shown to the public experiments of electric lighting with Lodygin lamps. I passionately wanted to see this new electric light... Many people walked with us for the same purpose. Soon out of the darkness we found ourselves in some street with bright lighting. In two street lamps, kerosene lamps were replaced by incandescent lamps, which emitted a bright white light.”

A crowd had gathered on a quiet and unattractive Odessa street. Some of those who came took newspapers with them. First, these people approached a kerosene lamp, and then an electric one, and compared the distance at which they could read.

In memory of this event, a memorial plaque was installed at house number 60 on Suvorovsky Avenue.

In 1874, the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences awarded A.N. Lodygin the Lomonosov Prize for the invention of the carbon incandescent lamp. However, without receiving support from either the government or city authorities, Lodygin was unable to establish mass production and widely use them for street lighting.

In 1879, 12 electric lights were lit on the new Liteiny Bridge. “Candles” by P.N. Yablochkov were installed on lamps made according to the design of the architect Ts.A. Kavos. “Russian Light,” as electric lights were dubbed, created a sensation in Europe. Later, these legendary lanterns were moved to the current Ostrovsky Square. In 1880, the first electric lamps began to shine in Moscow. Thus, with the help of arc lamps in 1883, on the day of the Holy Coronation of Alexander III, the area around the Cathedral of Christ the Savior was illuminated.

In the same year, a power plant on the river began operation. Moika near the Police Bridge (Siemens and Halske), and on December 30, 32 electric lights illuminated Nevsky Prospekt from Bolshaya Morskaya Street to Fontanka. A year later, electric lighting appeared on the neighboring streets. In 1886-99, 4 power plants were already operating for lighting needs (the Helios society, the plant of the Belgian society, etc.) and 213 similar lamps were burning. By the beginning of the twentieth century. There were about 200 power plants in St. Petersburg. In the 1910s light bulbs with metal filaments appeared (since 1909 - tungsten lamps). On the eve of the First World War, there were 13,950 street lamps in St. Petersburg (3,020 electric, 2,505 kerosene, 8,425 gas). By 1918, the streets were lit only by electric lights. And in 1920, even these few went out.

The streets of Petrograd were plunged into darkness for two whole years, and their lighting was restored only in 1922. Since the beginning of the 90s of the last century, the city began to pay great attention to the artistic lighting of buildings and structures. Traditionally, masterpieces of architectural art, museums, monuments, and administrative buildings are decorated this way all over the world. St. Petersburg is no exception. The Hermitage, the Arch of the General Staff, the building of the Twelve Colleges, the largest St. Petersburg bridges - the Palace, Liteiny, Birzhevoy, Blagoveshchensky (formerly Lieutenant Schmidt, and even earlier Nikolaevsky), Alexander Nevsky... The list goes on. The lighting design of historical monuments, created at a high artistic and technical level, gives them a special sound.

Walking along the embankments at night is an unforgettable sight! Citizens and guests of the city can appreciate the soft light and noble design of lamps on the streets and embankments of evening and night St. Petersburg. And the masterly illumination of the bridges will emphasize their lightness and severity and create a feeling of the integrity of this amazing city, located on islands and dotted with rivers and canals.

An invention such as a lantern turned out to be so useful that it became firmly established in everyday life for obvious reasons. Agree that there is not a single person in the civilized world who has never used this wonderful device! To begin getting acquainted with the world-famous manufacturer of some of the best flashlights in terms of price and quality, I suggest you familiarize yourself with the history of the flashlight itself.

Lanterns in history

Since the time of the “taming” of fire, humanity has always sought and invented ways to illuminate their lives in certain circumstances. The very first and most primitive lantern can be called an ordinary torch, which had a whole bunch of obvious shortcomings. Then, with the advent of wax, a candle was added to the means of lighting, and with the advent of combustible fuel - a kerosene lamp. Such light sources, although they were more advanced, also had their drawbacks - unsafety, short service life and the release of harmful substances during combustion.

The first street lamps appeared in England in 1417. They owe their appearance to the mayor of London, Henry Barton, who promulgated a decree on lighting city streets in the evenings, especially in winter.

The London lamps looked quite nice.

Subsequently, in 1667, the idea of illuminating the city at night was supported by the French king Louis XIV, who ordered the installation of oil lanterns on poles and houses throughout Paris. He also obliged all residents to install lamps in the windows of houses facing the street.

In our country, street lamps first appeared in St. Petersburg in 1706 by decree of Tsar Peter I, who ordered that the lamps be placed next to the Peter and Paul Fortress as a sign of victory over the Swedes. In 1718, lighting of the Neva River embankment appeared. And in 1730, street lighting appeared in Moscow.

The first street lamps of St. Petersburg.

The appearance of the first lantern is directly related to the invention of the incandescent lamp. The discovery was made by two people at the same time. The first is the Russian scientist Alexander Lodygin, who in 1874 patented a lamp in which coal was first used as a rod, and then tungsten.

The second inventor is the American Thomas Edison, who made a lamp (1879) that was reliable, economical and durable. The success lay in the material for the lamp rod, which used charred bamboo shavings. Edison not only created a model of a lamp that was practical and inexpensive to produce, but also established mass production.

Subsequently, Edison used tungsten as a material for the lamp rod, which was already used by his Russian colleague Alexander Lodygin. This is how two inventors in different countries, one might say, jointly gave the world the incandescent lamp.

But let's return to hand-held lanterns. Now there is a reliable and practical light source, all that remains is to develop a source of portable energy.

Battery history

The first electric battery close to the modern type was invented even before the advent of incandescent lamps in 1866 by the French inventor George Leclanche. It was a fairly large open glass vessel filled with an electrolyte and two electrodes. It is clear that such a power source could not be suitable as a battery for a hand-held flashlight. He was large in size, which is why he lacked mobility. But the main thing is that when the position changes, the liquid could easily pour out. This changed when, in 1896, German engineer Karl Gessner developed a small portable dry-type battery, which consisted of a zinc cylinder filled with a solid, paste-like electrolyte.

The first battery with solid electrolyte.

In fairness, one cannot fail to mention the so-called Baghdad battery, which was discovered in 1936 in the vicinity of Baghdad. The item is a vessel approximately 2,000 years old, containing a copper cylinder with an iron rod inside. The throat is filled with bitumen, and another iron rod with traces of corrosion is passed through it. A copy of the find showed that if you pour acid or wine or vinegar that contains acid into a vessel, the “battery” will begin to produce a voltage of 1 volt. Although this does not prove that the vessel was once used as a source of nutrition, as many skeptics believe. But, as they say, we have what we have.

Baghdad battery

So, power supplies and the incandescent lamp were invented. All that remains is to create the hand-held flashlight itself.

Handheld flashlights

Inventor David Maisel distinguished himself here, who in 1896 received a patent for a hand-held flashlight powered by three batteries. The lantern itself had a wooden body and a switch in the form of a metal plate that closed the electrical circuit. In 1898, American emigrant from the Russian Empire and inventor Conrad Hubert founded the Ever Ready Company to produce small batteries. By the way, today everyone knows this company as Energizer.

In the same year, he bought the patent from David and began producing hand-held flashlights. David Maisel remained to work with Conrad and improved the flashlights. This is how the first bicycle lantern appeared, and in 1899 the first hand-held lantern of a more familiar cylindrical shape.

Such flashlights also had a number of disadvantages - they could not shine for a long time (you had to turn off the flashlight - it could not provide stable light for a long period), and the light was rather dim.

Then it was a matter of technology - the company produces the world's first catalog (1899) and another 25 types of flashlights: tabletop, bicycle, handheld and other options. Thus began the era of hand-held electric lanterns - irreplaceable assistants, which replaced more imperfect and dangerous candles and kerosene lamps. Now you don’t need to think about the problem of lighting at the right time and in the right place!

Let's move on to the history of one of the most recognizable brands for the production of technological flashlights.

History of ArmyTek

It all started in 2007 when a small team from Canada became interested in LED lighting. The situation in this market was such that American and European companies offered reliable solutions, but lagged behind global trends in technology, and Chinese manufacturers relied on accessibility, but at the same time, were inferior in quality and technology. Against the backdrop of this situation, the young company decided to take a different path and start producing products that have all the necessary criteria - relative availability, reliability, quality and manufacturability. And we were already talking about the production of lighting equipment.

For these purposes, a team of the best scientists and engineers from the aviation, military and even space industries was assembled. Thanks to this, we were able to achieve amazing results in producing a first-class product. Another important decision was the use of high-quality components from the USA and Japan, in particular, the best LEDs from the American manufacturer Cree.

This is how the first Predator tactical flashlight appeared, which at that time contained many innovative solutions. The flashlight has passed the most severe tests in various climatic conditions.

And in 2009, production was opened in China, due to which it was possible to achieve competitive prices and mass production while maintaining constant quality and modern technologies. This is still facilitated by the use of modern equipment, proven materials and a thorough quality control system for the final product.

The final stage in the formation of the company was legal registration in 2010 in Canada under the name Armytek Optoelectronics Inc.

Why are Armytek flashlights so captivating? As has already been noted, the use of advanced Japanese and American components, the use of the latest technologies and equipment in production in compliance with quality control, as well as reliability, durability and manufacturability. The lanterns can easily survive falling from the tenth floor and being submerged under water to a depth of 50 meters. Tactical options can withstand the recoil of any caliber weapon and continue to operate smoothly. All this is reflected in the company's mission - to provide people with the most reliable and technologically advanced light in the world. The manufacturer's warranty is a full ten years for any flashlight!

And today, Armytek products are used by many people of different professions and occupations around the world: employees in special services, military personnel, security personnel, fishermen, hunters, rescuers, firefighters. Simply put, all those who need just such a trouble-free flashlight that works in difficult conditions, while having high-tech filling and various functions.

In the following articles we will look at various models of Armytek flashlights.

To be continued...

How did the first lanterns appear?:

The first lighting devices appeared many millennia ago. When the sun set and darkness fell, man remained defenseless from predators hiding in the darkness. Having tamed fire, primitive man began to use it in the dark. Fire provided light, warmth, and protection from wild animals. The need for safe movement at night led to the appearance of torches, which became a kind of portable light source.

Discoveries in the field of electricity led to the possibility of using it to create electric lighting devices. Attempts to use electricity for lighting were made in the first half of the nineteenth century. Thus, in 1838, the Belgian scientist Jobard created a lighting device with a carbon filament, and two years later an incandescent lamp with a platinum filament was designed.

The discovery of the phenomenon of electroluminescence of semiconductors in the twentieth century led to the creation of LEDs - semiconductor crystals that emitted light under the influence of voltage applied to them. The advent of LEDs has revolutionized the lighting industry and led to the creation of lighting devices with high brightness and low energy consumption.

Different types of flashlights - advantages and disadvantages:

Currently, the most common types of lanterns are: