The St Andrews Gas Company was set up in 1834. Gas manufacturing began two years later, with the first gas maker (a local man named William Fowlis) having been trained in Dundee. The gas was made from coal, and was used to light street lamps, and in homes and workplaces. By the end of the 1830s more than 300 properties in St Andrews were using gas. During the early twentieth century gas consumption was still rising (despite the fact that electric power was introduced to St Andrews in 1905). The St Andrews Gas Works continued to operate until 1962.