Excavation uncovers forgotten gas tank

By Michael Kelly

Norfolk Library patrons, inconvenienced by excavation of the parking lot to make way for a new, more accessible handicapped entrance, will have to scramble for parking space a bit longer than expected. After a successful, aesthetically pleasing restoration of the terra-cotta tile roof to its former glory, the next phase of the library’s ambitious renovation master plan was humming along when workmen came across mysterious pipes leading into the library basement. Following the pipes to the back of the library, they discovered, slumbering just beneath the surface of the ground, a more than century-old gas tank.

This Gilbert & Barker Combination Mixing Regulator, probably part of the Springfield Gas Machine, is in the library basement. Long disconnected to the gas tank outside, it mixed gas and air in order to deliver gas of a uniform quality to the lighting system.

Speculation commenced. Why would the library need a gas tank? Was it used as a fuel source for the nearby train station? Did Isabella Eldridge have a pump installed to fill up her car?

Though many people half-seriously suggested it would be best to just cover up the tank and get on with the project, Hope Childs, library president, dutifully notified the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection, which was on the scene the same day, setting in motion a series of events that are delaying the handicapped access project and most likely will involve considerable expense.

Closer inspection of the pipes revealed that they had never been properly secured and that only corrosion and the buildup of debris over the years prevented a potentially harmful gas leakage into the library. Fire Marshal Daryl Byrne and his team of volunteers, working with consultants Berkshire Environmental, set up a perimeter to safeguard the area and sealed the pipes with foam to allow for their subsequent removal.

Consensus now is that the tank was most likely a component of a sophisticated apparatus, called the Springfield Gas Machine, that supplied gas for lamps that illuminated the library when it opened in 1889. Ironically, a little over a decade later, electricity came to downtown Norfolk, rendering the gaslight system obsolete. Since then, as if in a fairytale, a vital piece of our history has been in repose, forgotten in the center of town, waiting to be discovered and to pique our 21st-century imaginations.

Upon completion of radar sampling around the library and the tank, the handicapped entrance work will recommence and removal of the gas tank will become an intriguing separate project. Stay tuned.

Photos by Michael Kelly.