Gas In 1850, almost 40 years after gas lamps were installed on Westminster Bridge in London, Bakewell UDC gas works were erected on Buxton Road. By late Victorian times there were many other gas companies in the Peak. Gas took lighting, heating and cooking into the 19th century. Shops and streets suddenly seemed brighter - when the circus came to Bakewell, children were most impressed when the clown bent down on his stilts to light a cigarette from the gas lamp in Rutland Square. It took a long time, though, to convince everybody that gas was safe. This was not surprising when plumbers like Mr Kirkland of Matlock Bridge assured his customers that he could give them ‘immunity from explosion’. Some people believed that gas produced fumes which were harmful to food, while one popular medical book claimed that gas heating took moisture from the human body, even from the windpipe and lungs ‘which could spare it least’. Read More >> More Pictures Community Life