A Look At The History Of Modern Home AC

The heat outside is sweltering hot. You can't wait to get home, take off your shoes, and enjoy the cool environment made possible by your home air conditioner. As much as you appreciate the air conditioning system that you have in your house, you probably have never stopped to think about the evolution that took place for it to be possible to be as cool in your home as you prefer to be in spite of high temperatures outside. Take a look at a few interesting facts about the history of modern home air conditioning systems.

Home cooling was once a really crude effort. 

All you have to do in modern times to cool your home is push a button or flip a switch. However, a long time ago, people really had to try hard to get the temperature inside their houses down to a more comfortable degree. Hanging curtains over open windows, using fans that distributed water mist, and even precariously placing large ice blocks in a room were just a few of the methods used for home cooling. These methods may have been slightly effective, but hardly enough to cause a room to be completely comfortable. 

Benjamin Franklin had a big role in AC development but didn't know it. 

In 1758, Benjamin Franklin made a discovery that would eventually lead to the development of modern home air conditioning systems. Through research, he discovered that when liquid evaporated it created a cooling effect, which is basically what happens in an air conditioning system that you would use today. Of course, it was several decades later that this discovery was used in an actual cooling process, so Franklin had no idea what an impact his discovery would have on the future.

Cooling was available for industries before residential customers. 

Charles Gilbert Gates was the very first individual to have a home with an air conditioning system in 1914.  However, before this, there were cooling units used in industrial facilities and in certain industrial processes. The units used by Gates to cool his home were large, incredibly expensive, and used ammonia as a cooling agent, so they emitted toxic fumes into the home. In 1922, an air conditioner compressor was added by Willis Carrier and a different coolant was used to make the units more home friendly. By 1953, the sale of window unit air conditioners hit a sales number of 1,045,000.