{"id":111,"date":"2024-06-21T13:01:59","date_gmt":"2024-06-21T17:01:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/mcguffey-house-and-museum\/?p=111"},"modified":"2024-06-21T13:01:59","modified_gmt":"2024-06-21T17:01:59","slug":"burning-the-midnight-oil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/mcguffey-house-and-museum\/2024\/06\/burning-the-midnight-oil\/","title":{"rendered":"Burning the Midnight Oil"},"content":{"rendered":"
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MG.1989.28 Student Oil Lamp. located in the History Room of the Museum<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Students have always needed task lighting for their studies. This brass oil lamp from circa 1884 may have been a solution for the late 19th<\/sup> century student.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although we do not know if this lamp was ever used at Miami, it was manufactured by Post & Co. in Cincinnati. Users could operate the lamp by filling the reservoir (on the right of this photo) with lamp oil. The oil would feed to the lamp on the left and create a flame by which to read. Many such items were equipped with shades to diffuse the light. Other styles could be fit with semi-reflective rings to focus the light on the task at hand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In The Miami Years, <\/em>Walter Havighurst describes a scene in which a lamp such as this might have been used. When \u201cNew Miami\u201d reopened in 1885 following \u201cOld Miami\u2019s\u201d closing post-Civil War, students found that \u201cthe old dorms had not changed from earlier years.\u201d He describes students lugging foodstuffs and firewood up to their rooms, where they \u201ccooked their meals on iron stoves and studied by the glimmer of oil lamps.\u201d Should all of that hauling make a student wish to clean himself up, he could avail himself of the dorm\u2019s \u201cgalvanized tub and a battered pail.\u201d The necessary facilities, of course, were outhouses. Not always the romantic picture we envision.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Source Consulted:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Havighurst, Walter. The Miami Years, 1809-1984<\/em>. New York: Putnam, 1984.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Students have always needed task lighting for their studies. This brass oil lamp from circa 1884 may have been a solution for the late 19th […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":8727,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,24],"tags":[6,20,8,25],"class_list":["post-111","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-artifacts","category-student-life","tag-artifacts","tag-education","tag-lifestyle","tag-student-life"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/mcguffey-house-and-museum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/mcguffey-house-and-museum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/mcguffey-house-and-museum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/mcguffey-house-and-museum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8727"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/mcguffey-house-and-museum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/mcguffey-house-and-museum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/mcguffey-house-and-museum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/mcguffey-house-and-museum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/mcguffey-house-and-museum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}