Historical Marker

First Texas Artificial Gas Plant

Jefferson Gas Light Company, chartered 1870 for public ;and domestic service, used retorts-- 7 foot iron drums with small necks-- to make illuminating gas. (One retort stood on this site.) Loaded with pine knots and rich pine wood, a retort was heated; its gas was forced into mains by use of a pressure drum.

Street lights on hollow posts, 300 feet apart, were 10-candle glass globes, lighted by a man on a ladder. These and gaslights in houses gave Jefferson-- then largest inland port and second largest city in Texas-- the state's first gaslight system.