J. V. Svenssons Fotogenköksfabrik
Stockholm, Sweden

J. V. Svenssons Fotogenköksfabrik took up production of blow lamps in 1895 .

Frans Wilhelm Lidqvist was born 1862 in the county of Västergötland in Sweden and after working a few years in Gothenburg he came to Stockholm were he was employed as a mechanic at AB Separator (later Alfa-Laval).

Here, another worker, Ludvig Holm inspired Lindqvist, and he developed the first kerosene pressure stove, which he got patent rights on in 1891. He sold his new stoves to friends and relatives.

The various models of the Primus pressure stove have been produced in around 45 million pcs.

In 1892 he came in contact with Johan Viktor Svensson who owed a small workshop and was prepared to invest some money in this new invention. Together they started the company J. V. Svenssons Fotogenköksfabrik in 1892 and the stoves were sold under the name of Primus.

The company 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. J. V. 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 was quickly followed by Nyberg starting production of stoves. Quite often you can see many similarities between the products in spite of patents 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.

After J. V. Svensson sold the company he travelled to USA to study car production with the plan to start up a car factory in Sweden. This however never materialised but instead he brought home a design of a crude oil engine. Based on this design, he started a factory producing the Avance engine. Also the the Avance engine was sold by B. A. Hjorth and Russia became one of the biggest markets.

To start a crude oil engine, a blow lamp is used to heat up the glow plug. As quite a few factories producing this type of engine grew up in Sweden, this also ment that there was an addional demand for blow lamps for this industry. These blow lamps have very often a different design which makes them interesting from a collectors point of view.

To read more about the Primus blow lamps, please go to the AB Primus page.