Nitrous oxide cylinder

Made:
1840-1868 in Europe
Empty nitrous oxide cylinder, used in dentistry(?), 1840-1868

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Empty nitrous oxide cylinder, used in dentistry(?), 1840-1868
Science Museum Group Collection
© The Board of Trustees of the Science Museum

Empty nitrous oxide cylinder, used in dentistry(?), 1840-1868

This gas cylinder, now empty, once contained nitrous oxide or ‘laughing gas’. In the late 1860s, nitrous oxide replaced chloroform as the preferred anaesthetic in dentistry.

In England in 1868, George Barth and J Coxeter, of Coxeter & Son, a surgical and medical supplier, developed a way to turn nitrous oxide from gas to liquid so it could be stored easily in cylinders and sold commercially. Two years later, Coxeter & Son began selling cylinders of nitrous oxide for 3 d per gallon in exchange for empty cylinders.

Details

Category:
Anaesthesiology
Collection:
Sir Henry Wellcome's Museum Collection
Object Number:
A625425
Materials:
copper
Measurements:
overall: 145 mm x 330 mm 145 mm, 2.46kg
type:
gas cylinder
credit:
Loan, Wellcome Trust