Most Boring Webcam Ever!

The hundred-and-two-year-old lightbulb.


Age: 100 years and counting (as of 2001)

Installed: First installed at the fire department hose cart house in 1901. Then moved to fire station at First and McLeod, then to its present site in 1976 at the fire station, 4550 East Ave., Livermore, California

Proof of Longevity: From local newspaper records; also GE engineers researched it. Was donated to the Fire Department in 1901 by Dennis Bernal who owned the Livermore Power and Light Co.

Vital Statistics: Made by the Shelby Electric Company, a handblown bulb with carbon filament. Approximate wattage-4 watts. Left burning continuously in firehouse as a nightlight over the fire trucks.

Recognition: Declared the oldest known working lightbulb by Guinness Book of World Records. Ripley's Believe-It-or-Not in 1972 researched it and declared it the oldest. Charles Kurault of the TV program "On the Road with Charles Kurault" visited the bulb in the 1970s and included it in his book as well.

Closest Competitors: A bulb in a New York City hardware store had been working since 1912, but it is unknown if it still works today. Another bulb in a washroom at the Martin & Newby Electrical Shop in Ipswich, England was dated from 1930 and burned out in January 2001.

They need to sell those things. I have a lightbulb curse, and at least one blows out in my house like every other week.
-J

illuminating

Well that makes the pitch drop experiment seem like the Indy 500.

[Edited on Oct 01, 2003 by carbauja]

i just wasted ten minutes of my life staring at that thing. it sucked me in like an infomercial, i was bored out of my mind but i couldnt stop watching.

but thats pretty much what everyone does. but ophilea has a very good point.

I thought this was going to be about the first webcam, the coffeepot-cam at Cambridge. Though, I guess since the coffee pot was sometimes full and sometimes empty, it was more exciting than the lightbulb. Maybe somebody will write XLightbulb so we don't need www access to see it?

RIP coffee cam.

How very odd...