Customs House
Customs House
This Richardsonian Romanesque structure, designed of rough and smooth stone, was built to house the federal post office and other U.S. Government offices. Added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973, this building continues to house the U.S. Bankruptcy Court and other governmental offices. Learn more about Cornerstones Inc. and the historic structures they have helped preserve in Chattanooga.
Click image to see an under construction view ~1892
PHOTO SOURCE: Mitch Kinder Collection
Early Street Lighting
The carbon arc lamp was the first widely-used type of electric light and the first commercially successful form of electric lamp. They produced super bright light and was the ONLY electric light available to light large areas from 1800 to 1901 and was cheaper to light streets with the arc lamp than gas or oil lamps
Walking along a city street in the early 1900’s you never would have guessed that the ornate lamps overhead housed machinery designed to regulate and maintain a superheated plasma arc. Remarkably, this technology was in large scale use by the late 1870’s long before the lightbulb was a commercial reality .