Sunday, November 13th, 2011
The Electric Light
Every day some new suggestion is made as to the probable use of electricity. A San Francisco professor thinks the time is coming when swamps and sewers will be deprived of their unwholesomeness by strokes of lightning, or, in other words, by electric currents that will kill the germs and spores that communicate disease to the human system. This is based upon the germ theory of disease, which is to the effect that malarial and other foul air contagions are due to animalcule, or infusoria, which multiply in the victim’s body after inoculation. But would it not be a miracle if all atmospheres were rendered wholesome by electrical discharges? The electric light has made one change in cities which may lead to important results. It has enabled buildings and other public works to be constructed at night as well as day. Laborers are employed in eight and twelve hour shifts, and edifices are completed in less than half the time required when only day work could be employed. In summer laborers prefer to work at night. Scientists tell us, as yet we only dimly appreciate the marvelous changes that will be wrought by electricity in human conditions.
Rio Grande Republican, February 18, 1882 (Newspaper)
See also:
First Electric Light in New Mexico
Tags: History, Electricity.
Leave A Comment
You must be logged in to post a comment.