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As countless fairy lights are switched on across the country, the nation has the North East to thank for what is now a key part of Christmas.

For fairy lights were invented by Joseph Swan, who perfected the incandescent electric lamp. Born in Sunderland in 1828, he made his home at Underhill at Kells Lane in Low Fell, Gateshead.

It was at the Savoy Theatre in London that the term “fairy lights” was first coined.

Opened in 1881, the Savoy was the first public building in the world to be lit entirely by electricity, fitted out with 1,200 incandescent light bulbs created by Swan.

A year later, Swan was commissioned by the theatre’s owner Richard D’Oyly Carte to create miniature lights for the dresses of the lead fairies on the opening night of Gilbert and Sullivan’s Iolanthe.

The dresses were adorned with lights powered by small battery packs hidden beneath the folds of the cloth.

A year later Edward Johnson, a colleague of Swan’s US rival Thomas Edison, became the first person to put fairy lights on a Christmas tree – a publicity stunt which would become a Christmas tradition.

Newcastle University energy expert Dr Sara will be shedding light on Swan’s role as part of BBC 2’s ‘Inside the Factory’ Christmas Special at 7.30pm on Monday.

Telling the story with the help of BBC presenter and historian Dr Ruth Goodman, Dr Walker says the invention of the light bulb transformed the theatre experience.

“Prior to this, theatres were lit with gas lights but these were dangerous, hot and used up the oxygen as they burnt so the air in the theatre would become unbearable by the end of the performance,” said Dr Walker, a senior lecturer and deputy director of the National Centre for Energy Systems Integration led by Newcastle University.

“Swan’s invention which encased a carbon-coated filament in a vacuum connected to an electricity source allowed us to use light in a way that we had never been able to before.

“Instead of a flame – which is basically what every light source before this had been – Swan had created something that was safe, gave out very little heat but lots of light and was long lasting.”

Swan’s bulbs revolutionised the way people lived and worked, and in the course of his research he also created the first man-made fibre which became rayon.

Light facts • “Being in the limelight” – the phrase comes from stage lighting which was previously provided by burning quick lime, which gave off a bright white light • In Victorian times, Christmas trees were lit with small candles. Because of the heat, they could only be lit for a few minutes at a time • Lights on dresses became the must-have fashion accessory of high society in 1882 • Swan used a carbonised thread as the bulb filament, and both he and Edison worked on improving the filament design in order to reduce the amount of current needed by their bulbs • Since then the incandescent lightbulb design has used tungsten as a filament material. More recently, low energy light bulbs and LEDs have been developed.

In 1880 at the Literary and Philosophical Society in Newcastle, Swan demonstrated his light bulb to a spellbound audience.

Swan had 70 gas jets turned down and replaced them with the calm and constant light of his bulbs. The Lit and Phil became the first public building in the world to be lit in this way.

The chairman of the event, fellow-inventor William Armstrong, was so impressed he installed Swan’s bulbs in his mansion at Cragside in Northumberland.

Swan also patented bromide paper, which underpinned the development of modern photography.

Since those first fairy lights at the Savoy, technology has moved apace and LEDs are now replacing the tradition light bulb.

“In the early days it was the vacuum that was the limiting factor,” said Dr Walker.

“After carbon-coated-cotton came tungsten wire filaments, and now we have fluorescent lights and LEDs which work in a different way again.

“I don’t suppose when Swan made those very first tiny lights for the fairies at the Savoy he would ever have imagined how they would one day twinkle in homes across the country for Christmas.”