GROUP 8

AGAPITO FLORES

PERSONAL AND EDUCATIONAL BACKGROUND

Agapito Flores was born in Guiguinto, Bulacan, Philippines on September 28, 1897.
He too came from a low-income background. Flores did not complete his high school
education due to poverty. He entered a workshop, and despite his poverty, he had big goals
that’s why he moved to Manila and settled in Tondo. He went to a trade school to study
electricity. He was admitted a month later. Aga pito Flores passed away in 1943.

INVENTION

Agapito G. Flores is a Filipino inventor who is though to have invented the

fluorescent light tube's funnel. As our elementary and high school textbooks proudly
recounted, an Agapito Flores, invented the fluorescent lamp and its very name is indelible
proof of its inventor. Years later, I would be disappointed to find out the Agapito Flores
story is actually a myth. In a 2001 Inquirer piece, science writer Queena Lee-Chua wrote:
”No scientific report, no valid statement, no rigorous documents can be used to credit
Flores for the discovery of the fluorescent lamp. We have tried to correct this
misconception, but the media (for one) and our textbooks (for another) keep using the
Flores example.” The word fluorescent, of course, comes from the Latin fluorspar (a
mineral) and opalescence – not from Flores. A prototype for the fluorescent lamp was
already patented by Peter Cooper in 1901 – when Agapito Flores was just four years old.

THE FLORES MYTH BUSTED

 According to the myth surrounding his supposed invention of the fluorescent lamp,
Flores allegedly was granted a French patent for a fluorescent bulb and the General Electric
Company subsequently bought those patent rights and manufactured a version of his
fluorescent bulb.

It's quite a story, as far as it goes, however, it ignores the fact that Flores was born 40 years
after Becquerel first explored the phenomenon of fluorescence, and was only 4 years old
when Hewitt patented his mercury vapor lamp. Likewise, the term "fluorescent" could not
have been coined in homage to Flores, since it predates his birth by 45 years (as evidenced by
the prior existence of George Stokes' paper)

According to Dr. Benito Vergara of the Philippine Science Heritage Center, "As far as I could
learn, a certain 'Flores' presented the idea of fluorescent light to Manuel Quezon when he
became president," however, Dr. Vergara goes on to clarify that at that time, the General
Electric Company had already presented the fluorescent light to the public. The final
takeaway to the tale is that while Agapito Flores may or may not have explored the practical
applications of fluorescence, he neither gave the phenomenon its name nor invented the lamp
that used it as illumination.

History of Fluorescent Lamp

 French physicist Alexandre E. Becquerel was the first to theorize about the building
of fluorescent tubes in 1857. He investigated the phenomena of fluorescence and
phosphorescence and experimented with coating electric discharge tubes with
luminescent materials, a process that was further developed in later fluorescent lamps.

 American inventor Thomas Edison, who made the first electric light bulb, was
considered one of the first inventors to apply for a patent (U.S. Patent 865,367) of the
earliest version of the fluorescent lamp on May 19, 1896, later published on September
10, 1907. He used X-rays to excite the phosphor but unfortunately, his model was never
sold.
 It was American Peter Cooper Hewitt (1861-1921) who filed the successful patent
(U.S. patent 682,692) on September 17, 1901, for the first mercury vapor lamp, the
descendant of the modern fluorescent lights.
  According to the Smithsonian Institute, Hewitt’s fluorescent lamp was built on the
work of German physicist Julius Plucker and glassblower Heinrich Geissler, who were
able to pass an electric current through a glass tube containing tiny amounts of a gas and
made light.

 Hewitt started working on that principle with mercury-filled tubes in the late 1890s.
He was able to produce a bluish-green light, which he thought wouldn’t be an ideal color
wanted by the people. So he collaborated with George Westinghouse to produce the first
commercial mercury lamps under the Cooper Hewitt Electric Company. Hewitt was later
credited as the inventor of the first enclosed arc-type lamp using metal vapor.

 By the time Hewitt had made the first prototype of the modern fluorescent lights in
1901, Flores was only four years old.
 Based on the data given, it is safe to conclude that Flores indeed wasn’t the first person
to invent the fluorescent lamp. Furthermore, there are no scientific bulletins or
documents claiming Flores as the inventor of the fluorescent lamp.
 Dr. Benito Vergara, a national scientist who worked at the Philippine Science Heritage
Center, was quoted as saying, “As far as I could learn, a certain Flores presented the
idea of fluorescent light to Manuel Quezon when he became president. At that time,
General Electric Co. had already presented the fluorescent light to the public.”
History tells us that there are other inventors who were far ahead of Agapito Flores. And the
term “fluorescent” did not come from the last name of the Filipino inventor. This might be
disappointing but this is the fact and we should live by this. Agapito Flores might not have
invented the first fluorescent lamp, but he is brilliant enough to have ever made such all by
himself.

GROUP 8
MEMBERS:
ABARCA, JEDIE
RIVERA, MARY JOY
JARABE, JANYN