Brandy,
Balloons, and Lamps
Ami Argand,
1750-1803
John
J. Wolfe
June
ISBN
0-8093-2278-1 / cloth / $59.95s
240 pages / 8.5 X 11 / 53 color plates / 106 b&w illustrations
World History
“Wolfe spins a cautionary tale exemplifying the legal and commercial hurdles between the perfection of an invention and any personal or financial success resulting from it. In the late 1700s, successful Swiss scientist Ami Argand patented a new kind of lamp, more efficient and far brighter than its predecessors, arranged for its manufacture, and developed market demand for it via public support from statesmen, scientists, businessmen, and royalty of both England and France. Yet because of vacillating support by his allies, skulduggery by his competitors, and a personality ill-attuned to business, he failed while others gained fame and profits from his invention. This first biography of Argand, a partisan defense against his victorious critics, is weakened by being based primarily on his business and legal correspondence, and so unavoidably nearly excluding his technical and scientific work. The reader learns more of the genius of Watt than of Argand. . . . Nearly 100 excellent photos and promotional paintings of the lamps. . .”--Choice
John J. Wolfe's lavishly illustrated Brandy, Balloons, and Lamps: Ami Argand, 17501803 is the first biography of the remarkable Genevese scientist who literally turned on the lights at the beginning of the Enlightenment to illuminate the Industrial Revolution. Featuring 53 color plates and 106 black-and-white illustrations, Wolfe provides a colorful record of how Argand advanced Western civilization.
Though modest about his accomplishments, Argand moved with ease in royal and scientific circles. Among his many inventions, he developed such a superior method of distillation that Louis XVI named him superintendent of the distilleries of France. With the Montgolfier brothers, he launched the world's first hot-air balloon. And dwarfing his other accomplishments, he revolutionized lighting for everyone.
Well aware of the importance of illumination, the best minds among a generation of intellectual giants turned their energies to the improvement of lighting. Scientists conducted experiments in France, England, and America, with the French and English governments offering handsome awards to anyone who could devise a method to improve street lighting. Joseph Priestley, Antoine Laurent Lavoisier, Jean-André Deluc, and James Watt debated conflicting theories of phlogiston. But it was Argand who gave the world an oil lamp that was cheaper, cleaner, and ten times more powerful than previous devices of illumination.
Wolfe tells Argand's amazing story through contemporary sources, including lively exchanges between Argand and his supporters, foes, and family.
As a collector of early lighting instruments, John J. Wolfe has served as a consultant on and a contributor to the chapter on lighting in the French Ministry of Culture's encyclopedia Les Objets Civil Domestiques. He was a lighting consultant for and a contributor to the restoration of the Matthew Boulton eighteenth-century home in Soho, Birmingham, England, and he assisted the Marie of Versoix, Switzerland, in the restoration of the collection of original Argand manufactured products. Wolfe is a founding member of the Historic Lighting Club of Great Britain and the author of numerous articles for their publication as well as for the Rushlight Club of the United States. He frequently lectures on Ami Argand's historic contribution to lighting in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. He resides in Normandy, France.
“One look at the color plates in this book and you might think that you were off on a decorative arts adventure. . . . John Wolfe’s book about Ami Argand is unprecedented, for he is the first to attempt a biography of this genius of scientific invention.”—Early American Homes
“Wolfe tells Argand’s amazing story through contemporary sources, including lively exchanges between Argand and his supporters, foes, and family.”—New England Antiques Journal
