1675 Picard Creates 1st Light

The Evolution of

Time Line

The technology behind creating light dates back before the actual age of electrical experimentation, long before Edison’s time. It was the year 1675 when the French astronomer “Jean Picard” observed a glow in a glass mercury barometer tube. when the tube was shaken and a glow called “Barometric Light” occurred. The actual cause of the light is static electricity. Even though the cause of barometric light was not understood, it was still investigated. Later, when the principles of electricity were discovered, scientists were able to move forward towards the invention of many forms of lighting, and eventually, neon lighting.

Heinrich Geissler’s Glowing Glass Tubes

In 1855 Heinrich Geissler developed a sealed glass tubes with two electrodes, and running an electric current thru it making the gas in the tube glow. He devised his famous mercury air pump which would later contribute to the success of Thomas Edison's first incandescent lamps in 1879 Geissler began experimenting with what were later to become known as the 'Geissler tube' and full-scale production of these were well underway in the 1880s. An electrical discharge through a partially evacuated tube glows with a color depending on the type of glass in the tube and the gas inside.

1855

In 1894 Sir William Ramsay’s discovers Argon and then isolates Helium . He had found the first and the third member of the group of inert gases (Helium and Argon). Ramsay seeks the assistance of Morris W. Travers and they searched for and found the member element Krypton. They then solidified some of their fifteen liters of Argon by surrounding it with liquid air boiling under reduced pressure. The result was a light with a complex spectra with many lines in red, a number of faint green, and some in violet. The yellow line is fairly bright, and persists at very high vacuum. This was the element they had been searching for. Ramsay maintaining the chemical family's name and called it "Neon". Sir William Ramsay got the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1904 because of his discovery of four of the noble gases (Neon, Argon, Krypton, and Xenon) which eventually led him to his discovery of Neon. The word neon comes from the Greek "neos," meaning "the new gas." Neon is a rare gaseous element present in the atmosphere to the extent of 1 part in 65,000 of air. Neon can be obtained by liquefaction of air and separated from the other gases by a process called fractional distillation.

1894 Sir William Ramsay Discovers the Chemical Element - Neon

Jean Picard French Astronomer

Heinrich Geissler German Glassblower & Physicist

Sir William Ramsay British Chemist