ON Valentine’s Day, the community gathered in Catherine Street to watch the 31st annual lighting of The Frome Valentine’s Lamp; one of the town’s most romantic landmarks.
At 5.30pm on Tuesday 14th February a rocket was launched into the air, summoning the community to the top of Catherine Hill for the annual lighting ceremony at 6pm, where the gas lamp was lit by founder and creator, Reg Ling.
The lighting ceremony has been held annually since 1993. This year ceremony was started by Westbury’s Town Crier, standing in for the Frome Town Crier.
During the ceremony the crowd sipped on mulled wine, whilst listening to Reg tell a humorous story and read a dedication that he had personally written, about life and love. The Town Crier read a plaque that sits behind the bench, that was separately installed for couples to sit and admire the view.
Speaking about ceremony and its purpose Reg said, “When I first started this project of the Valentine’s Day Lamp and the ceremony, it was an ambitious plan. I wanted to reflect the history of the street and dedicate the site to St. Valentine as a way for people to remember and reflect on life and love. I thought really hard about the dedication that I read out and felt it was extremely important to make it as diverse as possible. The ceremonies have always been well attended. We don’t do much advertising for it but people seem to know about it and still come.”
Reg moved to Frome from North London around 30-years-ago and has a background in mechanics and metal. He said, “I used to see the light at the bottom of Catherine Hill and always thought it was nice. It did have a bin attached to it then. Then, one day, I saw it in a skip and took the lighting column to the Catherine Street Residents’ Group that I was a part of. With my background, I knew what it would be worth.
“I proposed that we should do something with it and they gave me the freedom to do what I wanted, so I took it to my workshop that was near the Sun Inn pub at the time and I started looking at it and taking it apart. When I did that, I saw that it was a gas light. I rang up British Gas and they put in the gas for free then.
“Around the same time, I was separately given a Royal Mail King George V post box from the 1930s and decided to merge the two together. I suddenly realised that there’s something romantic about post boxes and gas lighting. Gas lighting is like the moonlight. When I decided this, it took over everything and it became a lamp dedicated to Valentine’s Day. A local artist in Frome helped me to decorate the lamp, that I later modified in 2014. It’s a project that took over me.”
The Valentine’s Day Lamp is illuminated daily but is only gas lit in the manual way on Valentine’s Day at the lighting ceremony.
Now aged 91 years-old, Reg is looking for people to take over the organisation and running of the lighting ceremony, and maintenance of the lamp. He said, “It takes about five or six people to run the event, you need someone to do the ceremony, someone to light the lamp and fundraisers. I am probably not able to do it for much longer but any help would be appreciated.”
The funds raised go towards the running of the event and maintenance of the lamp. For more information contact, enquiries@valentinegaslamp.com
