Regarding that 'burning fluid' headstone; if Mr. Danforth's Burning Fluid was anything like standard burning fluid (a popular lamp fuel in pre-kerosene days), it was 80 per cent pure alcohol and 20 percent redistilled turpentine. This stuff was widely used in the 1840s and 1850s as a lamp fuel as it was very cheap (unlike whale oil), very fluid (unlike whale oil) and could burn well in a simple lamp (unlike lard oil, the cheap substitute for whale oil which was also popular at this time). Unfortunately, Burning Fluid is extremely volatile- it vaporizes at a low temperature (Burning fluid lamps were designed to keep the heat of the flame as far away from the font of fuel as possible, but explosions and accidents were common)- and lamps were even reported to have exploded when unlit. Perhaps Ellen was unfamiliar with burning fluid. or maybe she just got unlucky.
Hence the "non-exploding" part of the title. That makes sense! I was a bit surprised to see that in the brand name, I admit, because I didn't think whale oil or lard oil exploded with that sort of regularity. I wasn't familiar with burning fluid until now- there can always be gaps in one's knowledge, even in a field of specialty!
I wonder, then, what made Danforth's so much worse than other burning fluid if the tendency to outgas was a feature of a not-uncommon type of lamp fuel. Maybe it was a situation where people were more cavalier with it than other burning fluid because of the "non-exploding" label, and that made it more dangerous? Maybe it had an unusual ingredient that caused even more volatility? Either way, thank you so much for the added context!
