First Texas Artificial Gas Plant

(5 blocks east) 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. (1966)

First Texas Artificial Gas Plant is a historical marker in Jefferson, Marion County, dedicated in 1966. It is one of 94 historical markers documented in Marion County in the Texas Historical Commission Atlas, among 132 historic sites cataloged across the county.

The site sits at 32.7570, -94.3450 near Jefferson. The nearest cataloged historic site is Jefferson Public Library (historical marker), about under a tenth of a mile away. Others within a short drive include Sterne Fountain, Federal Court and Post Office Building, and Brown Building.

This record corresponds to Texas Historical Commission Atlas #5315008036. Use the map below for its exact position and turn-by-turn directions.