The Golden State: Where & How to Live, Secure, Visit, Enjoy and Thrive in California

Turning Night Into Day

In the stearine candles of today the wicks are so made that they don't have to be snuffed. This is because the hottest part of the flame is not inside where it is difficult for the air to penetrate, but on the outside where there is more air.

You can easily prove this for yourself. Take a sheet of paper and hold it for an instant over the candle flame; a little circle will be burned in the paper; this shows that the flame is not so hot in the center as on the outside. In a tallow candle the wick is in the center of the flame all the time, so it doesn't burn well and gets a charred end.

In a stearine candle the wick is not twisted as in a tallow candle. It is braided. This tightly braided wick keeps unwinding at the end and these ends stick out into the hottest part of the flame and are consumed as the candle burns down.

A Candle Clock

In olden times when a man was asked what time it was he used to look at a candle instead of at a clock. And this was not because he was absent-minded, either, but because in those days candles were used not only to give light but also to measure time.

They say that in the chapel of Charles the Fifth a big candle was kept burning night and day. This candle was divided into twenty-four parts by black lines, denoting the hours of the day. Special servants were detailed to tell the king from time to time how far down the candle had burned.

This candle was no small one, of course. It was made just long enough to burn exactly twenty-four hours.

Centuries of Darkness

After the invention of torches, oil lamps and candles people were satisfied with this poor light for a long time. They were really wretchedly poor lights. Not only that, they also smoked and sooted and sputtered and guttered. It was enough to give anyone who wasn't used to it a headache.
Portable lanterns had chimneys made of metal sheets with holes punched in them, like a sieve. Only a small part of the light could get out through these holes.

No one had ever thought of such a thing as street lamps. Except on moonlight nights it was pitch dark on city streets at night. And street lamps were needed then even more than now, for the streets were not paved and the ground was rough and muddy and covered with filth.