Primus AB
Stockholm, Sweden

This is one of the early Primus blow lamps - The Swedish No 3.

The marking on top of the tank. This picture also shows the conical safety pin soldered into the tank and connected to the bottom.

The company started 1892 as J. W. Svenssons Fotogenköksfabrik with production of kerosene pressure stoves for cooking purpose. This invention was made by F. W. Lindqvist and the stoves were sold under the name of Primus.

B. A. Hjorth & Co. became interested in this product and a contract was signed in 1892 were B. A. Hjorth got the sole global marketing rights. The Primus stove became an enormous success and quite soon the name Primus was spread over the world.

Already 1893 a new factory was built but soon became too small and in 1907, the factory moved in to new facilities on the island of Lilla Essingen in Stockholm.

J. W. Svenssons Fotogenköksfabrik also took up production of blow lamps in 1895 in competition with C. R. Nybergs Lampfabrik (the first company producing blow lamps in Sweden). This lead Nyberg to start production of stoves and quite often you can see many similarities between the products in spite of the patents that applied.

Also the blow lamps received the brand name Primus and were marketed by B. A. Hjorth & Co. In 1898 the factory changed name to AB Primus and this company was in 1918 taken over by B. A. Hjorth to become a part of the Bahco group of companies. In a catalogue from 1907, they claim that they are the biggest blow lamp manufacturer in the world.

In 1918 the company was hit by a strike among the workers, which resulted in that a number of people left and established another company, AB Radius, which would turn out to be a tough competitor.

The Primus factory at Lilla Essingen in Stockholm around 1925.

Russia became one of the biggest and most important markets for the Primus products (as well as Bahco) and it was of course a catastrophe for the company when all that business came to an end with the Russian revolution in 1917. The biggest expansion of the company took place during the years 1918 - 1928 when importers and agents were established in most countries of the world.

During this period, the product variety increased and also new products like the kerosene pressure lamp were added. The production grew rapidly and in 1930 the Primus factory employed 700 people.

The increased use of propane gas for cooking and heating purpose lead to that AB Optimus, in Upplands-Väsby outside Stockholm, took over the kerosene products from AB Primus in 1962. In 1966, AB Sievert Apparater took over Primus from Bahco and a new company, Primus-Sievert AB, was formed with headquarters in Solna outside Stockholm.

Primus # 632 was probably the blow lamp that was produced in the biggest numbers. With the exeption of the handle, it remained nearly unchanged over the years.	A very rare Primus 44 in excellent condition.