Gas Lit Houses

Yes, my grandparents lived in a gas lit house until they died, in the mid-1970s.
I have very fond memories of visiting my great-aunt in her house with no running water, gas or electricity. I loved feast days with the trestle tables set out so beautifully. I didn't mind the earth closet at all but my cousin hated it!
I remember the lamps (oil or paraffin, can't remember) with globes filled with water. She told me how, when doing 'outwork' she had to make sure she did the blackwork by day because the light wasn't good enough to do in the evening, but she could still embroider.

My Grandma's house had gas lamps for a time but then they were replaced by electricity. I cannot remember when but do remember her lighting the lamps.

When I came home from school, I was around 7-8 years old, my dad had to nip home from work to light the gas light for me because I was too young to be let loose with matches.

1’ve never lived in a gaslit house, but in the 1950s a friend of mine did. I know she had a candle at night.

We also had a family friend who lived in a house that looked like a small castle in the wilds of Wales. It was lit by oil lamps and candles. We children thought it was very exciting, but my mother difn’t likr’

Sorry, that posted itself. It was meant to say my mother didn’t like it.

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

In the late 1960s, when the conversion to natural gas was taking place my aunt insisted on having the several gas mantles in her otherwise electrically lit house converted to naturalgas - and found them very useful during the electrical power cuts that accompanied the industrial disruption of the early 1970s.

We had no central heating for ages in our family home, open fires, then gas fires, but I do remember a Tilley lamp with a gas mantle. Dad used to get cross if it got broken.
I think the Tilley lamp was some sort of heater, but not sure.

We looked at a cottage in the 1970's that only had gas lights. We didn't buy it as the building society wouldn't lend on a property that needed so much work.

Our first rented flat by the sea had gas streetlighting and I believe it has those gas lights even today. Some parts of London also still have gas lighting.

www.theguardian.com/culture/2015/dec/25/londons-last-gas-street-lamps

There is a pub in Beverley, E Yorks called The White Horse (although known to all as Nellies after a previous landlady), where they still have gas lighting. It's very atmospheric. Does anyone know of any others?

That's a really interesting article SueDonim. I had no idea there was still gas street lighting in parts of London, including Westminster Abbey.

I was quite taken aback when I saw the article, GoneGirl It made me think of Mary Poppins!

We had a range like that in the kitchen, Marydoll, I've no idea what fuel was used but I can remember my mother having to blacklead it.
It was changed to a gas cooker in the 1950s, nice and modern!

Yes! My granny used to blacklead ours.

We burnt coal, and any wood we collected from the woods.

No gas lamps, but we had a very old-fashioned gas fridge with ornate legs liker a piece of Chippendale. It was by the back door and the pilot light on it was always blowing out - I had a very sensitive nose and my parents came to believe me if I said I could smell gas and they would go and check the fridge. A bit scary really - no elf and safety then!

And my grandma in London had the scariest bit of gas kit in the bathroom - a gas geyser that would roar when it lit up and frighten me to death. I used to dread having a bath.

Gas geysers were almost invariable in bathrooms (and kitchens) if you did not want to light the big coal fuelled stove in the kitchen. In every flat I rented in the 1960s, all water heating was done by a geyser. The first house my sister bought in 1977 had a geyser for water heating until she had raised enough money to rip it out and install central heating.

I do indeed remember gaslights and the lamplighter with his ladder over his shoulder riding his bike one-handed.
We had gas lighting in our avenue in Liverpool and the hiss of the lamps and the sound of the foghorn on the Mersey, were quite spooky.
We even had chimney sweeps carrying huge extendable brushes on their bikes and spreading a big cloth on the kitchen floor before fitting the rods together.
Happy memories of winter nights.

It’s time to take the window to see Leerie going by;
For every night at teatime and before you take your seat,
With lantern and with ladder he comes posting up the street.

Now Tom would be a driver and Maria go to sea,
And my papa’s a banker and as rich as he can be;
But I, when I am stronger and can choose what I’m to do,
Oh Leerie, I’ll go round at night and light the lamps with you!

For we are very lucky, with a lamp before the door,
And Leerie stops to light it as he lights so many more;
And O! before you hurry by with ladder and with light,
O Leerie, see a little child and nod to him tonight!

Mum used to read this book to us at bedtime.
I can recite all the verses within and the book holds many happy memories.

Sorry...missed out the first two lines:
My tea is nearly ready and the sun has left the sky;
It’s time to take the window to see Leerie going by;
...

I've still got that book in a cupboard upstairs. I loved it as a child.

"A birdie with a yellow bill
Hopped upon my windowsill.
Cocked his shining eye and said,
Ain't you shamed you sleepyhead?"

The land of counterpane.

"When I was sick and lay abed
I had two pillows at my head"

Can't remember the rest....

"Little Indian, Sioux or Crow,
Little frostie Eskimo.
Little Turk or Japanee,
Oh don't you wish that you were me?"

I'll shut up now.

Brought back memories Gabriella.

Yes indeed Gonegirl
That book was a 5th birthday present from my then best friend Jean Anderson in 1950 and she wrote birthday wishes on the flyleaf.