12/12/2025
It’s the early 1900s and as a dock worker, you have to make it to work before the sun rises. As you prepare to leave, the dense darkness ahead makes it near impossible to see what’s ahead as you mount your bike with this acetylene lamp attached. Once lit, the bright white light that pours from the lamp’s front facing lens cuts through the darkness and allows you to make it in to work safely and in time.
But how does a lamp like this work? While the lamp our archaeologists have recovered is not whole, it does have a majority of the parts needed to function. Water would have been poured into the tank on the back which would in turn drip down into the missing container on the bottom. Inside this container, would have been pellets of calcium carbide which would instantly react creating acetylene gas where the user could then light with a match in the main housing. The turn key on the side helped to control the rate at which water would enter the bottom chamber which in turn would control how much gas would be created. Besides the bottom container, the only thing missing from this lamp are the colored pieces of glass that would sit on the sides acting as warning lights, and of course, the bike itself.
