At the Paris Auto Show, French inventor Georges Claude demonstrated the first neon lamp. It emitted a brilliant light that quickly found application in advertising lighting due to its magical quality. It was also called liquid fire. In reality, it didn’t burn anything: neon never consumed anything. The first neon-lit advertisement was the word CINZANO on the Champs-Élysées in 1913. It was later discovered that argon produced a pale blue, and adding a little mercury produced a brilliant white, and colored glass produced all other colors. Claude, with his patents, became wealthy, effectively holding a monopoly on noble gas lighting for several years.
