The 1870s photograph featured in Saturday's letters page is of an office building fronting large gasworks premises at Black Rock, Brighton.
The man in the top hat would be looking out to sea. These works - run by the Brighton Light and Coke Company - were established in 1818, when George III was king.
The railway from London would not reach Brighton for another 23 years.
The company built its gasworks at Black Rock to avoid paying tax on the coal it burnt because the area was then outside the boundary of Brighton Parish.
The first place to be lit by the firm was the grounds and main rooms of the Marine Pavilion, the building that would later be transformed into the Royal Pavilion we see today.
The company was absorbed by a rival, the Brighton and Hove General Gas Company, in 1882.
Its premises, dating from 1835, were located next to St Andrew's Church, Church Road, in Hove, from where a gasometer has recently been removed. In 1885, production stopped at Black Rock and the site was used for storage only.
It could have been then the old offices seen in the photograph were demolished. Huge works at Portslade next took over, supplying gas for the Brighton area until 1971.
Don't think all this is history well past its sell-by date. A few Brighton houses in Montpelier Road and others in Ladysmith Road still had gas lighting - no electric light - right up to the Seventies.
-Chris Horlock, Brighton historian, Church Green, Shoreham
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