Electrically lit lighthouse (South Foreland)
Faro iluminado con electricidad (South Foreland)
- Date
- 1858 · confidence medium
- Place
- South Foreland, Dover, Kent, England, United Kingdom
- Credited to
- Trinity House; Frederick Hale Holmes
- Field
- Movement
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
Trials of lighthouse illumination with an arc lamp fed by Holmes's magneto-electric machine, which Faraday inspected. It gave a light many times brighter than oil.
South Foreland trialled electric light in 1858, but permanent use is credited to Dungeness (1862) or South Foreland (1872), depending on the source.
What it led to
- electric-light lighthouses on British coasts
- generators at lighthouse stations
- long-range marine lighting