Comments on: Happy birthday, air conditioning!

By: princeminski

princeminski — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 22:14:00 +0000

I know mine. Don’t touch my air conditioning.

By: tsol

tsol — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 21:42:00 +0000

Willis Carrier didn’t build that!

By: Peaked

Peaked — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 15:50:00 +0000

“In fact, air conditioning is still the tool that makes things like computers possible, by creating dust-free, low-humidity clean rooms where the parts can be manufactured.”

Not to mention allowing the high density data centers that back the Internet, almost all of which require many tons of AC equipment each.

By: CLamb

CLamb — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 14:57:00 +0000

Its ironic that the first building with central air conditioning is now cooled by window units.

By: CLamb

CLamb — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 14:56:00 +0000

Dehumidifiers trap dirt through a process called viscous impingement. Dust particles stick to the wet cooling coils.

By: David Wlazlo

David Wlazlo — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:30:00 +0000

What about Persian windcatchers?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windcatcher

By: penguinchris

penguinchris — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:02:00 +0000

I understand wanting to conserve electricity, as central AC can use quite a bit of it, but the people who won’t turn it on until the heat is just unbearable are the worst. I’ve lived with people like that, people who are not poor and who spend money on stupid shit all the time but who think it’s too expensive to run the AC. I understand conserving if you really can’t afford it, but otherwise it’s just silly (so long as it isn’t set to an extravagantly low temperature, which isn’t comfortable anyway).

By: CH

CH — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 10:58:00 +0000

Can live without both. Don’t have air conditioning in our house (we do have in our car) and I’ve lived without a shower as a small kid, could easily do it again.

By: Beanolini

Beanolini — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 08:15:00 +0000

I’ve lived without either of those for 19 years now.

P.S. I suspect you’re not a real hobo.

By: Ant

Ant — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 05:48:00 +0000

My parents are cheap to turn on the central AC. They say it is too expensive too! :(

By: Prospero761

Prospero761 — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 03:09:00 +0000

So glad to share a birthday with AC!

By: Ashley Coats

Ashley Coats — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 03:07:00 +0000

A/C! I could live with a bath for the rest of my life. No one would be able to tolerate living with me if I didn’t have air conditioning.

By: lava

lava — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 01:05:00 +0000

back in the 70′s Carrier Corporation ran a poetry contest for a poem to commemorate Willis Carrier. I believe the winner was posted in the lobby of their headquarters in NYC. I searched all the tubes but could not find any record of it.

By: lava

lava — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 01:04:00 +0000

so true.

By: Donald Petersen

Donald Petersen — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 21:45:00 +0000

Them damned Williamsburg hipsters… even their air was cool before anyone else’s.

By: llamaspit

llamaspit — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 21:33:00 +0000

Quite correct. He developed the ability to manufacture ice as a way to keep patients in the hospital cool. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Gorrie

By: DreadJester

DreadJester — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 21:20:00 +0000

Although I do enjoy my A/C I still feel that in some ways it brought about the downfall of neghborhoods. Now instead of everyone hanging out on the porch talking and waving at their neighbors we seal ourselves up in our homes with the windows shut tight and curtains closed to keep out the heat. No longer does anyone care about their neighbors because they barely see them, let alone know them. With every invention there are good sides and bad sides.

By: retepslluerb

retepslluerb — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 21:15:00 +0000

Showers. But I live in a climate that doesn’t create a need for air conditioning. Even the summer heat could be dissipated with adjusted building techniques.

By: j dale

j dale — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 21:13:00 +0000

A/C? if we’re talking about conditoned air that has reduced humidty, then this is correct. But if you’re talking about ‘chilled air’ then I believe it was invented in Florida as a means to reduce the effects of malaria. John Gorrie in 1842…

By: mostlydigital

mostlydigital — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 20:52:00 +0000

That’s 110th anniversary…

By: StreetEight

StreetEight — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 20:42:00 +0000

Not to mention year-round sessions of the U.S. Congress, a development from which we have yet to recover.

By: bzishi

bzishi — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 20:08:00 +0000

I don’t know if I would say that this was the invention of air conditioning. It is probably better to say that the dehumidifier was invented. AC to me involves more than lowering the heat index by removing humidity. But then again, that might be my modern bias. I’m sure a dehumidifier 100 years ago would be a godsend.

I question the conclusion in the NYT article that dehumidifiers reduce dust. It actually works in the opposite way. Humidity prevents dust from going airborne and it reduces the probability of electrostatic discharges. Of course, you want to control it in a band.

Actually, reading a little further, it looks like he did invent an evaporation cooling mechanism, so his design definitely classifies as an air conditioning system.

By: Samuel Slaton

Samuel Slaton — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 19:55:00 +0000

A link! http://bushwickbk.com/2010/06/07/birth-of-the-air-conditioner/#

By: Samuel Slaton

Samuel Slaton — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 19:53:00 +0000

And, also, it would’ve been the 110th anniversary.

By: Samuel Slaton

Samuel Slaton — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 19:51:00 +0000

I believe a different (though attached) building on the block was the first to have air-conditioning, namely the old Sackett & Wilhelm Lithographing and Publishing Company at 1027 Grand Avenue (which would technically be Bushwick, I think, given that it lies east of Bushwick Ave.). Story goes that the printers would gum up in the summer heat, prompting the proprietors to seek out a solution, which Willis Carrier provided. I lived in that building for almost a year back in 2010/2011, and can attest to the huge cistern beneath the back lot, the old remnants of the AC system scattered throughout the building, and faded paint declaring the building’s former use.

By: royaltrux

royaltrux — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 19:51:00 +0000

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zK-30442RII
“Eat the cheeseburger, astroboy!”

By: Dan Hibiki

Dan Hibiki — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 19:40:00 +0000

we celebrate by having the Astronaut make paninis for everyone.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fHISoYOWMNs/TrVMQgu__GI/AAAAAAAAA28/POAD1bu4KZ0/s1600/com3x6_04.gif

By: Adam Kruckenberg

Adam Kruckenberg — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 19:37:00 +0000

I call that Bushwick.

By: SomeGuy

SomeGuy — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 19:23:00 +0000

“In fact, air conditioning is still the tool that makes things like computers possible, by creating dust-free, low-humidity clean rooms where the parts can be manufactured.”

Not to mention the really essential stuff….chocolate.

By: Gbaji

Gbaji — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 19:22:00 +0000

No single development is as responsible for the current electoral heft of the American South as the invention of the air conditioner.