Everything I Love: Air Conditioning
Air conditioning has been improving our lives since its debut at the 1904 World's Fair in St. Louis, making it one of the 20th century's three most important inventions. The struggle for comfort from which AC emerged is faintly reminiscent of the American Civil War. Florida physician John Gorrie's early efforts to emancipate the heat-oppressed were quashed by Boston 'Ice King' Fred Tudor who made a fortune off the ice requirements of poor, sweltering southerners. This time the South triumphed over Northern aggression when Carolina working man's hero Stu Cramer relieved heat-struck workers everywhere when he installed humidity control in his textile mill, naming it 'air conditioning'. Yankee Willis Carrier quickly swiped the name and slapped it on the window and central air units we have today.
Although temperature control is an ongoing source of family tension on road trips, I contend there's nothing better than walking into your meat locker of a house when the humidex tops forty-two degrees centigrade. Southern Ontario's outrageous temperature range - from a nose-hair stiffening forty below to a stifling forty above - makes acclimation impossible. Tree-huggers denounce our liberal cranking of thermostats in summer, but I make no apologies. Comfort's an entitlement and AC's the enabler.
5 comments:
Well put.
The other two most important inventions ... the television and the automobile?
Or is it Internet porn and the indoor grill?
For me the trinity is rounded out by cruise control and the automatic dishwasher.
I thought about the television remote control, but my brother and I discovered, when my father ditched cable television for several years in the 1980s, that you can survive by seating yourself directly in front of the set and change the channels with your toes. I am now as blind as a bat, but channel surfing prevailed.
I agree but my choices would be the automobile not forgeting the air conditioning units, DVDs and fast food.
Air conditioning has been improving our lives since its debut at the 1904 World's Fair in St. Louis, making it one of the 20th century's three most important inventions.
Brooklyn AC units
This is the kind of service that everyone will want to subscribe to. Because it directly goes to its market to provide its services, it allows for much more convenience. I wonder what size their truck is. It probably contains everything they need to provide their services.
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