Origins of Ordinary Things 3: Refrigerator
Refrigerators
Edited from Wikipedia
Before the invention of the refrigerator, icehouses were used to provide cool storage for most of the year. Placed near freshwater lakes or packed with snow and ice during the winter, they were once very common. In fact, using nature to cool food is still common today: on mountainsides, runoff from melting snow higher up is a convenient way to cool drinks, and during the winter months simply placing one’s milk outside one’s window is sufficient to greatly extend its useful life.
In the 11th century, the Persian physicist and chemist, Avicenna, invented the refrigerated coil, which condenses aromatic vapors. This was a breakthrough in distillation technology and he made use of it in his steam distillation process, which requires refrigerated tubing, to produce essential oils.
The first known artificial refrigeration was demonstrated by William Cullen at the University of Glasgow
in 1748. Between 1805 (when Oliver Evans designed the first refrigeration machine that used vapor instead of liquid) and 1902 (when Willis Haviland Carrier demonstrated the first air conditioner), scores of inventors contributed many small advances in cooling machinery. In 1850 or 1851, Dr. John Gorrie developed an ice maker. In 1857, Australian James Harrison introduced vapor-compression refrigeration to the brewing and meat packing industries. Ferdinand Carré of France developed a somewhat more complex system in 1859. Unlike earlier compression machines, which used air as a coolant, Carré’s equipment contained rapidly expanding ammonia. The absorption refrigerator was invented by Baltzar von Platen and Carl Munters in 1922, while they were still students at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden. It became a worldwide success and was commercialized by Electrolux.
At the start of the 20th Century, about half of households in the United States relied on melting ice (in an icebox) to keep food cold, while the remaining half had no cooled storage at all. The ice used for household storage was expensive because ice had to be cut from winter ponds (or mechanically produced), stored centrally until needed, and delivered regularly.
In a few exceptional cases, mechanical refrigeration systems had been adapted by the start of the 20th century for use in the homes of the very wealthy, and might be used for cooling both living and food storage areas.
Marcel Audiffren of France championed the idea of a refrigerating machine for cooling and preserving foods at home. His U.S. patents, issued in 1895 and 1908, were purchased by the American Audiffren Refrigerating Machine Company. Machines based on Audiffren’s sulfur dioxide process were manufactured by General Electric in Fort Wayne, Indiana and marketed by the Johns-Manville company. The first unit was sold in 1911. Audiffren machines were expensive, selling for about $1,000 — about twice as much as the cost of an automobile at that time.
General Electric sought to develop refrigerators of its own, and in 1915 the first Guardian unit was assembled in a back yard wash house as a predecessor to the Frigidaire. In 1916 Kelvinator and Servel introduced two units among a field of competing models. This number increased to 200 by 1920. In 1918, Kelvinator had a model with automatic controls.
These home units usually required the installation of the mechanical parts, motor and compressor, in the basement or an adjacent room while the cold box was located in the kitchen. There was a 1922 model that consisted of a wooden cold box, water-cooled compressor, an ice cube tray and a 9 cubic foot compartment for $714. (A 1922 Model-T Ford cost about $450.) In 1923 Frigidaire introduced the first self-contained unit. About this same time porcelain covered metal cabinets began to appear. Ice cube trays were introduced more and more during the 1920s; up to this time freezing was not a function of the modern refrigerator.
The first refrigerator to see widespread use was the General Electric “Monitor-Top” refrigerator introduced in 1927. The compressor assembly, which emitted a substantial amount of heat, was placed above the cabinet, and surrounded with a decorative ring. Over 1,000,000 units were produced. As the refrigerating medium, these refrigerators used either sulfur dioxide, which is corrosive to the eyes and may cause loss of vision, painful skin burns and lesions, or methyl formate, which is highly flammable, harmful to the eyes, and toxic if inhaled or ingested. Many of these units are still functional today. These cooling systems cannot be recharged with the hazardous original refrigerants if they leak or break down.
The introduction of freon expanded the refrigerator market during the 1930s, and freezer units became more common during the 1940s. Home units did not go into mass production until after WWII. The 1950s and 1960s saw technical advances like automatic defrosting and automatic ice making. Developments of the 1970s and 80s brought about more efficient refrigerators, and environmental issues banned the use of CFC (freon) refrigerants used in sealed systems.
Early refrigerator models (1916 and on) featured a cold compartment for ice cube trays. Successful processing of fresh vegetables through freezing began in the late 1920s by the Postum Company (the forerunner of General Foods) which had acquired the technology when it bought the rights to Clarence Birdseye’s successful fresh freezing methods.
The first successful example of the benefits of frozen foods occurred when General Foods heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post (then wife of Joseph E. Davies, United States Ambassador to the Soviet Union) deployed commercial-grade freezers to Spasso House (US Embassy) in Moscow in advance of the Davies’ arrival. Post, fearful of the food processing safety observed in the USSR, then fully stocked the freezers with products from General Foods’ Birdseye unit. The frozen food stores allowed the Davies to lavishly entertain and serve fresh frozen foods that would otherwise be out of season. Upon returning from Moscow, Post (who resumed her maiden name after divorcing Davies) directed General Foods to market frozen product to upscale restaurants.
Introduction of home freezer units occurred in the United States in 1940, and frozen foods began to make the transition from luxury to necessity.
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