Whodunit Wednesday: Jan Pieter Minckelaers

On the market in Maastricht stands a statue of a man holding what looks like a stick. He is clearly not from our time. Most statues are of people from the past and this is no different. I remember when we first moved to Maastricht, this statue was quite different. A flame rose from the stick in his hand. That made sense once I knew that this was a statue of Jan Pieter Minckelaers. 

Who? Minckelaers was the inventor of gas lighting. No, not gaslighting. Gaslighting is when you trick someone into thinking something that you want them to think. Often it is used to make someone feel guilty for something you yourself have done. Think of the movie “Gaslight”. There are lots of examples of gaslighting that have happened throughout the ages. But that is not what Minckelaers discovered. 

He literally was the one who came up with the idea of making street lights (and lights in houses even) using gas. Imagine, if you can, a time before electricity, before led’s and lighting that is so simple you can put it anywhere. Instead of using candles or oil lamps with wicks, people used lit gas. That meant that gas lines ran all through the city, into homes, everywhere. 

These days we might be worried about leaving the gas stove on when we leave the house - it would cause an explosion. But in previous centuries this was an amazing discovery. Light could be had at any time. You could turn it up or down. And yes, although it might have been dangerous, it was amazing to be able to see when it got dark at night. People could work in the evening. Streets became safer. 

Minckelaers stood on the market as a reminder of this wonderful invention. The flame was always burning. That is, until it got too expensive for the city to keep it burning. Then they put in a coin machine so that tourists or citizens of the city could pay to make the lamp go on. In the end, the city even removed that possibility. 

We heat our house using gas. We also cook on gas. And of course we put gas (diesel in our case) into our car. Our society may have moved away from gas, but not completely. We are told that electricity is the best thing since sliced bread, even though most of it comes from gas. 

In a time when gas prices have risen immensely, sometimes at the drop of a hat and for any possible excuse, it is not hard to confuse the idea of gas lighting and gaslighting. Now Minckelaers stands with an iron staff sticking out of his hand into the empty air.