Tripping the light fantastic

Retired electrician Roy Fisher owns Britain's oldest working light bulb - 113 years old and still glowing strong.

Roy, 78, unearthed the astonishing treasure while renovating the cellar of a house in Margate, Kent.

Sotheby's auction house has estimated the bulb could have been made as early as 1895 - just 15 years after Thomas Edison invented the light bulb in 1880.

light bulb

Roy's electrifying discovery (file picture)

Great-grandfather Roy, who now lives in Spalding, Lincolnshire, is thrilled that his electrifying discovery still emits light.

He said: 'It's incredible to think it still works after all this time. These days they don't last six months, let alone 100 years or more.'

Roy found the light bulb buried next to another one, thought to date from the 1920s, whilst carrying out the building work in 1982.

He said: 'Both the bulbs were welded into the sockets, so I cut them down and eventually, with a little persuasion, managed to get them out.

'I knew one of them was an Edison because it had a distinctive little pimple on the end and had Edison's name on it, so I was keen to find out how old it was.'

Roy kept his enlightening find stored in a padded box for 25 years until he saw a national newspaper article about a 70-year-old light bulb, claimed to be Britain's oldest.

He has decided to hang on to his record-breaking bulb, despite a request from the local electricity board to display it in their museum.

Roy added: 'I really don't know if they have any monetary value or whether they belong in a museum.

'I'm just glad I found them as important pieces of history from a time when things were made to last.'