The silent servant is what electricity used to be called in its early days. Martin Roundell Greene, who has written a book about the coming of electricity to Lyme Regis, brought back electrifying memories to many at the Langport & District History Society at their April meeting, describing how something so vital, but so taken for granted in our everyday lives, arrived gradually in our part of the world.

In its early days, electric power was most commonly used for lighting. In 1862 Dungeness became the first lighthouse to be powered by arc lights, and in the 1870s electric lights were used at football matches, theatres – and at Blackpool. In 1881 Godalming installed electric street lighting driven by a dynamo at a watermill.

Lyme Regis became the first town in Dorset to get electricity, in 1909, thanks to the efforts of local landowner and entrepreneur Alban Woodroffe, who established the Lyme Regis Electric Power and Light Company and persuaded other investors to join. The street lighting was dim by modern standards, varying between 25 and 60 watts. Some places in Somerset had had electricity for many years – Taunton since 1886 and Bristol since 1893. A member of the audience volunteered the information that it had not reached High Ham until 1954!

Private enterprise, however, led to hundreds of different electricity supply companies. London alone had 70 suppliers. There were different voltages; some were AC, others were DC, and prices varied in different places. By the 1930s a National Grid was established at a single voltage. Lyme Regis remained independent of the grid until the malt house housing its generator burned down, leaving them no alternative. The all-too familiar electricity pylons began marching across the countryside. Interestingly, most other countries call them ‘transmission towers’, but ours were specially designed and were called ‘pylons’ after the name of the entrance to an Egyptian temple, to give them an air of ancient grandeur. There is even a Pylon Appreciation Society – how times change.

For more information see Electric Lyme: the coming of electricity to an English seaside town, by Martin Roundell Greene (2006).

The next Langport & District History Society talk will be on Monday 9th May at 7.30 pm in Langport Library. Patrick Browne will be talking about baroque and rococo architecture. All welcome. Talks are free to members; £2 per talk for visitors.

Janet Seaton

Langport & District History Society

April 2011