The Comforts of Home: The American House and the Evolution of Modern Convenience - Softcover

Ierley, Merritt

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0609807528 ISBN 13: 9780609807521

Publisher: Three Rivers Press, 2001

Synopsis

The Age of Technology is nowhere made more personal than at home. Modern convenience shapes our daily routine, making today's American house a place of comfort, the like of which has never been known. Yet of all aspects of modern technology, it is the evolution of what is in the household that has
been least written about.
        
In The Comforts of Home, an unprecedented work written for a general audience with no particular knowledge of science or technology, social historian Merritt Ierley weaves in aspects of architecture, social history, and technology to present an underexplored but central feature of American cultural identity: how our lives are shaped by the domestic technology around us. Here we see a simple brick cubicle with a stove inside it evolve into central heating, a barrel with a large handle become the automatic washing machine, a box lined with charcoal birth the modern refrigerator, and the modern toilet develop from a rudimentary stone trough.
        
The Comforts of Home charts the evolution of mechanical systems--from central heating to lighting, from kitchen to bathroom, from washing machine to vacuum cleaner--on which we all depend and without which most of us could hardly imagine surviving. It is also the story of the people responsible for the revolution of convenience in the home: people like Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford, a British Loyalist, inventor and spy who fled his home in the American colonies in 1776. His genius of invention returned in the form of inventions with practical impact on everyday life in the household. Or like architects Benjamin Latrobe and James Gallier, Jr., who defined the cutting edge of modern convenience for their times. The Comforts of Home is also the story of ordinary people like David and Ida Eisenhower, who provided their son Dwight and his brothers with a home that increased in comfort the way most American homes did--bit by bit, appliance by appliance, advance by advance--as new technology became cheaper and more widespread, and more a part of everyday life.
        
The story of the convenience of modern living is compellingly traced in this delightfully written book illustrated with nearly 200 photographs and vintage illustrations.

Front and back illustrations, c. 1892, show a Standard Gas Machine apparatus that was used for supplying one's own home with illuminating gas in the age of gaslight (courtesy of Smithsonian Institution). Inset shows delivery of a 1960s automatic "Ice Maker" refrigerator (courtesy of Whirlpool Corporation).
From the Hardcover edition.

About this title

From the Author

We are a society both fascinated by technology and charmed by history. Yet the history of what is closest to usthe technology that makes us comfortable at homeis unfamiliar to most people. When did we first have central heat, and what was it like? What did people do before central heat? (Think about that some night as the mercury starts sliding and you need only adjust a thermostat to be warm.) For that matter, when did we first have thermostats? Or kitchen sinks with running water, as opposed to a bucket to haul water in from a well? Or bathrooms, as opposed to the outdoor privy or galvanized tub on the kitchen floor? For those who take comfort seriously, THE COMFORTS OF HOME: The American House and the Evolution of Modern Convenience will be something of a revelation. Beyond accounting for kitchen sinks, vacuum cleaners, and air conditioning, THE COMFORTS OF HOME also relates the assimilation of household technology to its attainability and traces its evolution vis--vis the development of power supply and infrastructure that make it all work.

-- Merritt Ierley

From the Back Cover

"Sorting through a great amount of information, the author of The Comforts of Home has woven together an extremely thorough and delightfully readable story. . . ."
--From the Foreword by William E. Worthington, Jr., assistant curator, History of Technology, Smithsonian Institution

"Using rare illustrations and fascinating text, Ierley points out those moments of change when new technologies
made possible the increasing comfort and convenience of domestic life. An eye-opening book."
--Jane C. Nylander, president, Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities (SPNEA)

"In Open House, Ierley pulls together a detailed and fairly fascinating picture of the many forces--ingenuity, technology, marketing, and needs inherent to our climate and landscape--that have helped shape the American house...he draws it all into lucid and useful context that gives us insight not only about the shape of the structures we inhabit but about the very shape of our American character."
--Preservation, the magazine of the National Trust for Historic Preservation
"Merritt Ierley's latest book is a welcome addition to the study of historic buildings, particularly for those interested in the 'nuts and bolts' of how houses work, and how they have changed over time. Here are cogent essays on the beginnings of modern household infrastructure--the conveniences that have transformed modern home life and indelibly changed the way houses are planned, used, and ultimately adapted to new technology."
--Orlando Ridout V, architectural historian, Maryland Historical Trust

"If you have ever sat in a nice warm bath and thought about the conveniences that make a modern home so comfortable, or if you have ever turned up the thermostat on a chilly winter evening and marveled at our ability to control comfort level with our fingertips,then you will find this book fascinating. In a very readable manner Ierley traces the history of domestic technologies, including central heat, cooking, plumbing, and lighting-- all systems that are never quite so appreciated as when they fail."
--Frank G. White, curator of mechanical arts, Old Sturbridge Village, Sturbridge, Massachusetts

Edition details

• Publisher: Three Rivers Press
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0609807528
• ISBN 13: 9780609807521
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 288