Many of the tools and objects we use today originated as a founding idea that has been developed and refined throughout history. Modern air conditioning is one example, as someone in the past took action to resolve a conflict that many others contributed to, furthering its improvement.
Dr. John Gorrie’s Contribution
Our history begins with Dr. John Gorrie’s call to fight against deadly diseases through proper cooling in hospital rooms, or in his own words, “the evils of high temperatures.” His initial thought in achieving temperature-controlled hospitals proved to be difficult; the process would involve shipping ice from northern America all the way to Florida, which was expensive. But as most inventors do, they think of other ways to make their ideas function. Gorrie decided to create cooling, even if it was artificial. His experiments with artificial cooling led to his ice-machine. In 1851, he developed a machine that created ice with a compressor. This machine had two double pumps that condensed the air inside the hospitals, submerging it in the coils of the machine. Water condensed out into a holding tank that connected with brine, which created ice bricks. He created a cooling process that paved the way for indoor cooling several years later.
Willis Carrier’s Big Idea
In the 1900s, engineer Willis Carrier built on his idea to make something more expansive. Willis Carrier is an engineer credited with forming the first air conditioner, doing so while working at the Buffalo Forge Company. In 1902, Carrier worked out a technology that was able to dehumidify the air, resolving the high humidity levels at the Sackett-Wilhelms Lithographing and Publishing Company. Whenever the humidity levels were too high at this company, the magazine pages began to wrinkle from all the condensation created within the printing room. Carrier created a machine with various coils that were filled with cool water. And as the moisture from the inside created condensation on the coils, the humidity levels began to lower.
Carrier’s air conditioner was pathbreaking. Soon after, countless public institutions would embrace this cooling technology, changing the idea of comfort forever. An idea that began with Gorrie would expand to almost every home and business in the nation today, but the history of modern air conditioning does not end here.
~Nevaonna Alfred