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Byler and examining primary-source gaps. It reconstructs what “black light” meant historically, from early UV/infrared filtering techniques and Wood’s glass, through military signaling and medical detection. The piece evaluates how Byler’s education, patents, and research context at GE and U.S. Radium could align with later commercial “Blacklight” devices.",{"@graph":69,"@context":123},[70,84,106],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":40,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/light-touch-who-invented-the-black-light/142739/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/light-touch-who-invented-the-black-light/142739.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Dozel","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-10-17","2026-08-25",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":105},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",11,{"@type":107,"mainEntity":108},"FAQPage",[109,115,119],{"name":110,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":112},"Why is William H. Byler repeatedly credited with inventing the black light in 1935?","Question",{"text":113,"@type":114},"Many sources point to a 1935 attribution without providing documentary evidence. The article traces the claim back to an alumni-magazine account but finds no matching patent or contemporaneous record from 1935.","Answer",{"name":116,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":117},"What did “black light” mean historically?",{"text":118,"@type":114},"The term evolved from earlier meanings that could refer to infrared or UV light into a hardened definition focused on ultraviolet wavelengths (about 160–400 nm).",{"name":120,"@type":111,"acceptedAnswer":121},"What alternative history does the article present for early UV-lamp development?",{"text":122,"@type":114},"UV sources and filtering methods were developed in the 19th and early 20th centuries, including prism/diffraction approaches and Wood’s glass filters used for UV transmission and visible blocking. Later devices were marketed as “Blacklight,” including by Sylvania within a few years of the late 1930s.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":125,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":127,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":129,"site_id":62},142739,1787687210,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":132},{"doc_id":129,"user_id":133,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":134,"doc_module":4,"category_id":39,"category_name":40,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":135,"file_id":136,"file_url":137,"file_type":138,"file_size":139,"view_count":105,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":14,"language":140,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":141,"faqs":142,"seo_title":143,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":130,"read_time":24,"preview_page_count":4},962085662650,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_29158cc5080c5b710cf443261637dec0","~~ ~~ Pulses  \nGetty Images  \nLIGHT TOUCH  \nWho Invented the Black Light?  \nStephen R. Wilk investigates the mysteriously undocumented attribution  \nof the popular ultraviolet lamp.  \nIf you Google “Who invented the black light?” you will  \nget one unequivocal answer—William H. Byler, in 1935. I performed such a search last year while researching fluorescent paint. But none of the websites noted where this information came from.  \nI was finally able to trace it back to an article,“Remembering Blacklight Inventor William H. Byler,”by Michael Greife in the University of Central Missouri (UCM) alumni magazine. From this, I learned that Byler, graduate of UCM and the University of Missouri (UM), was a member of Sigma Tau Gamma and patented the black light in 1935. The fraternity cited the invention when they awarded Byler the Distinguished Alumni Achievement Award in 1983.  \nI looked for Byler’s 1935 patent, but couldn’t find a patent for an ultraviolet (UV) light by him in that year, or in any other. Byler filed 17 patents in his lifetime, but none of them prior to 1940, and none of them for a black light. I scoured his published papers and articles—still, no mention of the invention.  \nBlack-light odyssey  \nWhat, exactly, is a black light? I’ve traced the term back to at least 1916. Although it originally meant either infrared or UV light, it soon hardened into a term referring exclusively to UV light (160 nm to 400 nm wavelength).  \nIt’s clear that Byler did not invent the UV lamp—various sources producing UV light were developed  \n20 OPTICS & PHOTONICS NEWS DECEMBER 2018  \nin the 19th and early 20th centuries, before 1935. In the 19th century, UV light was separated from visible light in a broadband source using prisms, diffraction gratings or blue-glass filters.  \nIn 1903, the optical physicist Robert W. Wood announced that he’d found a better filter: a solution of nitrosodimethylaniline, which absorbed virtually all visible light while passing the UV. During World War I, he produced an even better solid-glass filter, known as“Wood’s glass.” Lamps made using the UV-transmitting/visible-blocking filter became known as “Wood lamps,” and Wood himself championed their use during World War I for secret signaling between ships, or between airplanes and bases. After the war, the discovery that UV light could be used to detect a variety of dermatological conditions made it a sought-after device.  \nRight place, right time? Though the documentation may not be there, Byler was in a particularly good position to produce anew type of UV lamp. Born in 1904, Byler went to Central Missouri State Teacher’s College (now UCM), where he obtained bachelor’s degrees in chemistry and physics in 1927. He later earned his master’s degree and doctorate from UM. In 1937, Byler joined the General Electric Corporation (GE) in Schenectady, New York. Just two years later, he accepted a position as director of research for U.S. Radium Corporation in New Jersey, where he stayed for the rest of his career. After retiring in 1971, he continued to obtain patents.  \nAs a graduate student, Byler’s assistantship was in luminescence research. In several of his papers, he describes making a source for  \nByler obtained 17 patents, including this 1977 patent for an optical device for pre-operative cataract patients.  \nThough his claim to the black light may be speculative, Byler certainly had no shortage of accomplishments.  \nlongwave-UV light by combining UV sources with filter glass. In 1937, when Byler joined GE, the corporation was in the process of developing the modern fluorescent tube. It would have been just the place to obtain anew high-pressure mercury lamp, with the new non-corroding electrodes developed at GE, and combine it with a UV-filter glass.  \nBy 1938, someone had certainly taken these steps. Within a few years, Sylvania was selling such a device under the name “Blacklight.” Infact, in the 1940s, Byler wrote several papers published in JOSA in which","cbCaioVKA14uU3So","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaioVKA14uU3So","pdf",474271,"English","# Who Invented the Black Light?\n## Tracing the 1935 claim\n## What a black light is\n## Byler’s position and research context\n## Verdict and legacy","[{\"question\":\"Why is William H. Byler repeatedly credited with inventing the black light in 1935?\",\"answer\":\"Many sources point to a 1935 attribution without providing documentary evidence. The article traces the claim back to an alumni-magazine account but finds no matching patent or contemporaneous record from 1935.\"},{\"question\":\"What did “black light” mean historically?\",\"answer\":\"The term evolved from earlier meanings that could refer to infrared or UV light into a hardened definition focused on ultraviolet wavelengths (about 160–400 nm).\"},{\"question\":\"What alternative history does the article present for early UV-lamp development?\",\"answer\":\"UV sources and filtering methods were developed in the 19th and early 20th centuries, including prism/diffraction approaches and Wood’s glass filters used for UV transmission and visible blocking. Later devices were marketed as “Blacklight,” including by Sylvania within a few years of the late 1930s.\"}]","LIGHT TOUCH - Who Invented the Black Light? | PDF"]