“How did you do that?”

Brian Radam at the British Lawnmower Museum in Southport was demonstrating to a 16-year-old work-experience volunteer how to light an old gas stove.

“How did I do what?” countered Brian.

“Make that flame when you ran that little stick across that box.”

That 16-year-old had never seen or experienced a match. My flabber has never been so truly gasted!

Makes you realise that things that one generation takes for granted as commonplace are not necessarily carried forward to succeeding generations.

It seems that a replicable and usable friction match was invented in 1826, and a safety match in 1855. They were so common during my childhood in 1950s Lincoln that the roadside gutters usually contained numerous matchsticks; I was even led to try making matchstick models, but soon gave up as it was all too messy and tedious – all that sticky glue!

After nearly 200 years, matches appear to be in the ‘long tail’ of their lifecycle. It seem unlikely that they’ll ever disappear altogether, but you never know…

Picture by thebarrowboy viw Wikimedia Commons