WEBVTT - How Clothes Dryers Work 0:00:03.360 --> 0:00:06.360 Get in touch with technology with tech Stuff from how 0:00:06.440 --> 0:00:13.600 stuff Works dot com. Say then, everyone, and welcome to 0:00:13.720 --> 0:00:16.720 tech Stuff. I'm Jonathan Strickland and I'm Lauren Foke OBAM 0:00:16.840 --> 0:00:20.160 and Laurena. Here's someone on Facebook. Wanted to know about 0:00:21.040 --> 0:00:24.799 some tech related thing, right, yeah, Thomas on Facebook road 0:00:24.800 --> 0:00:27.120 in and to to us two guys and one gal 0:00:27.360 --> 0:00:31.240 here at tex Stuff. Hey, nol you were represented. Nol 0:00:31.400 --> 0:00:35.400 Is is smiling from behind his barrier, very gentitely, raising 0:00:35.400 --> 0:00:38.919 the roof. I believe, yes, I think so um, but yes, yes, 0:00:39.000 --> 0:00:41.519 so so Thomas wanted to know now that we have 0:00:41.600 --> 0:00:46.160 done an episode about washing machine, how dryers were Okay, 0:00:46.400 --> 0:00:49.960 all right, excellent. Yeah, and guys, remember we asked at 0:00:49.960 --> 0:00:52.120 the end of every episode if you have ideas, send 0:00:52.159 --> 0:00:54.520 them in and we mean it. Yeah, do that. So, 0:00:54.640 --> 0:00:57.760 first of all, we're talking about dryers. So what was 0:00:57.840 --> 0:01:02.440 the first clothes dryer, Lauren? The Sun? Yeah, that thing 0:01:02.560 --> 0:01:05.920 is just pulling so much double duty, I mean triple duty, 0:01:06.040 --> 0:01:10.200 like like quintuple duty. What's what's above quickly, Yeah, like 0:01:10.240 --> 0:01:12.800 infinite duty. Yeah, there's a lot of duty going on 0:01:12.880 --> 0:01:17.520 with the sun, including drying our clothes. So clearly, if 0:01:17.600 --> 0:01:21.119 you've ever had to dry close without having the use 0:01:21.120 --> 0:01:23.600 of a dryer. I've done this. I think a lot 0:01:23.600 --> 0:01:25.399 of people have done this at some point or other. 0:01:25.480 --> 0:01:27.600 Maybe fewer today than back when I was a kid. 0:01:27.959 --> 0:01:29.880 But it depends on where you live. If you're in 0:01:29.880 --> 0:01:32.399 the middle of a city, perhaps yeah, maybe not so much. 0:01:32.520 --> 0:01:34.520 You might have gone to a laundromat or something. But 0:01:34.959 --> 0:01:37.800 most of if you look at history, most people use 0:01:37.920 --> 0:01:41.479 the sun in some form or another by laying wet 0:01:41.480 --> 0:01:43.880 clothes that have just been washed out on on on 0:01:43.920 --> 0:01:45.880 a rock or hanging it on a line or over 0:01:45.920 --> 0:01:48.280 the branch of a tree yep, and just letting the 0:01:48.320 --> 0:01:51.000 sun do its thing evaporate all that water. Usually take 0:01:51.080 --> 0:01:54.200 you know, a couple hours um depending upon where you 0:01:54.200 --> 0:01:56.120 were at, how hot it was, how humid it was. 0:01:56.960 --> 0:02:01.200 Humidity could slow things down, obviously, not only dried up 0:02:01.240 --> 0:02:04.000 the clothing, it would also cause colors to fade over time, 0:02:04.120 --> 0:02:06.800 sometimes pretty quickly, depending upon the dye being used. Now, 0:02:06.840 --> 0:02:09.360 sometimes you plan for that, that was what you wanted. 0:02:09.400 --> 0:02:12.000 In fact, the Romans used to use various types of 0:02:12.040 --> 0:02:14.960 minerals and rub them in on the cloth. They would 0:02:15.000 --> 0:02:18.079 make during the drying process. An arctic to um specifically 0:02:18.120 --> 0:02:20.520 fade or or even bleach it. Yeah, so that way 0:02:20.560 --> 0:02:23.040 you get that nice white toga look, um, and then 0:02:23.080 --> 0:02:25.600 you can go to all the parties because in Roman 0:02:25.680 --> 0:02:29.560 times they were all toga parties. Okay, I was gonna 0:02:29.560 --> 0:02:31.120 see if I can get an eye roll, but instead 0:02:31.160 --> 0:02:33.400 of Lauren just gave me the staring right into my 0:02:33.480 --> 0:02:37.080 soul look, which is terrifying. So we're gonna move on. Okay. 0:02:37.200 --> 0:02:41.760 So so wash your technology evolved, Um it really intricately, 0:02:42.040 --> 0:02:45.480 as as you may have heard in our previous episode. 0:02:45.560 --> 0:02:49.440 But since the sun is relatively effective and drying clothes 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:54.000 this way is not really difficult, backbreaking, time consuming work, 0:02:54.400 --> 0:02:57.119 dryer technology didn't really develop along the same lines. Yeah, 0:02:57.200 --> 0:02:59.079 it just it wasn't as big a deal because yet, 0:02:59.120 --> 0:03:00.840 to wash something you had to put in a lot 0:03:00.880 --> 0:03:04.120 of effort, right, you had to, especially before the washing machine, 0:03:04.120 --> 0:03:07.160 you had to scrub things manually or stomp on them 0:03:07.320 --> 0:03:09.840 or beat them against rocks or throw them away and 0:03:09.840 --> 0:03:12.040 get new stuff. I mean, it just was not easy 0:03:12.120 --> 0:03:15.600 to do, and so there was a need to develop 0:03:15.720 --> 0:03:18.880 automation there. It just it felt like there's this is 0:03:18.960 --> 0:03:23.560 so much work. It's it's the woman's dread as we 0:03:23.600 --> 0:03:26.760 said in the last podcast, according to one quote, so 0:03:27.480 --> 0:03:29.480 that made sense. But for drying, like you said, it 0:03:29.520 --> 0:03:32.239 was it was free to dry it by the sun, 0:03:32.320 --> 0:03:34.000 so you didn't have to you know, put in any 0:03:34.120 --> 0:03:36.880 kind of expense there except maybe for a clothesline and 0:03:36.920 --> 0:03:39.600 maybe some maybe some closed pins, but that's about it. 0:03:40.200 --> 0:03:42.640 And uh yeah, you just had to lay it out 0:03:42.640 --> 0:03:44.800 and collect it. That's all the labor that was involved. 0:03:44.840 --> 0:03:48.120 So it wasn't as imprintant to develop a dryer, but 0:03:48.320 --> 0:03:52.080 it didn't make things convenient, right, You couldn't have dry 0:03:52.160 --> 0:03:55.320 clothes very quickly using that rate. So if it happened 0:03:55.920 --> 0:03:59.080 or something like that, Yeah, So there certainly were people 0:03:59.120 --> 0:04:01.080 who were thinking there's to be a way to dry 0:04:01.120 --> 0:04:03.520 close even if the weather is bad, or to do 0:04:03.560 --> 0:04:05.600 it more quickly than just putting them all on the 0:04:05.680 --> 0:04:07.640 sun for a few hours. And I'm sure that a 0:04:07.640 --> 0:04:09.600 lot of people were doing this. But the history of 0:04:09.640 --> 0:04:11.760 this kind of thing is a wee bit contentious, as 0:04:11.760 --> 0:04:13.840 we find out every time we look into the history 0:04:13.840 --> 0:04:16.200 of something. Yeah, as it turns out, when you want 0:04:16.200 --> 0:04:18.559 to look at the history of something that's been around 0:04:18.560 --> 0:04:21.400 for at least a couple uh, like like a century, 0:04:21.480 --> 0:04:24.120 or more, and especially something that was done by the 0:04:24.240 --> 0:04:27.160 lower classes who were not writing about it or or 0:04:27.279 --> 0:04:31.640 certainly not contributing to scientific journals very frequently, or perhaps 0:04:31.880 --> 0:04:36.120 didn't bother to patent something, then it's hard to find 0:04:36.560 --> 0:04:40.520 reliable records. So here's a big caveat for all the 0:04:40.600 --> 0:04:45.159 historical stuff you're about to listen to, dear listeners. The 0:04:45.360 --> 0:04:49.760 caveat is that we did a lot of background research 0:04:49.839 --> 0:04:52.520 to try and verify as many claims as we could, 0:04:52.560 --> 0:04:55.560 and a lot of them are unverifiable, meaning that there 0:04:55.560 --> 0:04:59.440 are no primary sources that are definitive. There are a 0:04:59.480 --> 0:05:02.120 lot of sources that quote each other, but it becomes 0:05:02.160 --> 0:05:05.160 kind of a circular thing. Yeah, which does happen on 0:05:05.200 --> 0:05:09.120 the internet. Uh, not entirely and frequently right, Um, But 0:05:09.279 --> 0:05:10.919 so so, most of what we're going to tell you 0:05:10.960 --> 0:05:13.960 comes directly from the U. S. Patent Office. That's what 0:05:14.040 --> 0:05:17.400 I relied upon most heavily. Although our first example is 0:05:17.440 --> 0:05:20.560 not among them because it wasn't a United States invention, 0:05:20.600 --> 0:05:23.120 it was actually a French one. This is one you're 0:05:23.120 --> 0:05:24.839 going to see if you ever do a search for 0:05:24.880 --> 0:05:26.760 the history of dryers, this is going to pop up 0:05:26.760 --> 0:05:29.960 all the time. Usually the year is specifically seventeen, but 0:05:30.000 --> 0:05:31.719 the best I'm going to say is around the year 0:05:31.760 --> 0:05:36.440 eighteen hundred. A French inventor known only as Poshan p 0:05:36.720 --> 0:05:39.680 O c h O N sometimes listen as M. Posh On, 0:05:39.760 --> 0:05:43.920 but I believe the M is for Monsieur Poshan, not 0:05:43.960 --> 0:05:48.120 necessarily a name that begins within, created what he called 0:05:48.240 --> 0:05:51.240 a ventilator, which to me sounds like a weapon you 0:05:51.240 --> 0:05:54.000 would pick up in Duke Newcombe. But in this case, 0:05:54.040 --> 0:05:56.680 a ventilator was a metal drum that had some small 0:05:56.720 --> 0:05:58.760 holes in it. So that might start to sound familiar 0:05:58.800 --> 0:06:01.880 already to anyone who's used a dryer. And you put 0:06:01.960 --> 0:06:04.599 your wet clothing into the drum and turn it using 0:06:04.600 --> 0:06:07.800 a hand crank, right, and you think, well, okay, so 0:06:07.880 --> 0:06:10.600 now you're just turning a drum full of wet clothes 0:06:10.680 --> 0:06:12.640 with holes in it. What else you have to put 0:06:12.680 --> 0:06:15.240 it near a fire, yeah, as your source of heat. 0:06:15.040 --> 0:06:19.200 And now here's the thing. Um. Sometimes this meant that 0:06:19.240 --> 0:06:23.400 clothes would get a little uh you know, burnt, Yeah, 0:06:23.440 --> 0:06:25.919 a little little extra crispy um or or full of 0:06:25.960 --> 0:06:28.000 smoke in any case, Yeah, so you would end up 0:06:28.040 --> 0:06:31.320 damaging clothes this way, And according to most reports this 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:35.320 is the first tumble dryer, but didn't catch on, mostly 0:06:35.360 --> 0:06:38.440 because of the downsides, Right, the idea that you would 0:06:38.520 --> 0:06:40.839 end up damaging clothes, Well, if you're gonna damage them, 0:06:40.839 --> 0:06:44.480 then that's not helpful at all. So the interesting thing 0:06:44.480 --> 0:06:47.239 to me is that this basic approach that he took 0:06:47.720 --> 0:06:50.920 ends up being the the kind of the central design 0:06:51.560 --> 0:06:53.960 of dryers in the future. It would just take a 0:06:54.040 --> 0:06:58.200 long time to perfect the heating elements, like a couple years. Yeah, 0:06:58.440 --> 0:07:05.120 so sorry, but yeah, but it's interesting that again, we 0:07:05.120 --> 0:07:07.640 couldn't really find any primary sources on this, so this 0:07:07.720 --> 0:07:10.680 story could be apocryphal. However, I'm going to go ahead 0:07:10.720 --> 0:07:15.800 and say that it sounds like it's possible, so we'll 0:07:15.800 --> 0:07:19.760 give it a pass. Sure. Then in this is the 0:07:19.800 --> 0:07:23.600 next really official dryer technology that we have to report on, 0:07:23.760 --> 0:07:25.640 and it's one that we actually mentioned in our episode 0:07:25.640 --> 0:07:28.800 about washing machines. That's when um Ellen Edgley invented a 0:07:28.880 --> 0:07:31.640 ringer to sit on top of washing machines and help 0:07:31.760 --> 0:07:34.280 dry out the laundry before you hang it on a line. 0:07:34.440 --> 0:07:37.840 So so that's that's squeezing mechanism to the two rollers 0:07:38.240 --> 0:07:40.960 and it rolls the clothing between and squeezes them with 0:07:41.000 --> 0:07:43.240 incredible pressure that could crush your fingers if you get 0:07:43.280 --> 0:07:46.200 them too close. Don't do it right right. The design 0:07:46.320 --> 0:07:50.840 would later be integrated into washing machine models until these 0:07:50.880 --> 0:07:55.680 tumble dryers later caught on. Yeah, so two, we have 0:07:55.800 --> 0:07:59.240 another African American inventor, this one by the name George T. 0:07:59.560 --> 0:08:03.239 Samps And, who filed a patent for a clothes dryer. 0:08:03.400 --> 0:08:05.920 In this case, he spelled dryer d R I E R, 0:08:06.080 --> 0:08:08.560 which some of the patents are in that spelling. Some 0:08:08.640 --> 0:08:10.440 of them are d R y E R I. Can 0:08:10.480 --> 0:08:13.840 do what they want. His invention wasn't a tumble dryer, however, 0:08:13.880 --> 0:08:16.680 although I saw a lot of notes that said it 0:08:16.720 --> 0:08:19.840 was an improvement or, in the case of some of them, 0:08:19.920 --> 0:08:27.120 a betterment of Poshan's approach. Uh, it wasn't wasn't like, No, 0:08:27.240 --> 0:08:29.520 it wasn't a tumble dryer. The I think the betterment 0:08:29.960 --> 0:08:34.240 or improvement would be that he used a stove as 0:08:34.280 --> 0:08:36.320 the heat source as opposed to an open flame, so 0:08:36.360 --> 0:08:39.520 it reduced the kind of damage that could happen. But yes, he, 0:08:39.760 --> 0:08:41.840 as he pointed out, it was not a tumble dryer. 0:08:41.880 --> 0:08:43.960 It was not like a drum that you put clothes in. 0:08:44.400 --> 0:08:46.920 It was more of a frame, and you would put 0:08:46.960 --> 0:08:50.080 the clothes within the frame, secure it in the frame, 0:08:50.280 --> 0:08:52.720 and then put the suspend the frame near the stove 0:08:52.840 --> 0:08:55.880 and the heat would would end up evaporating the water 0:08:55.920 --> 0:08:59.240 out of the clothing. So, uh, it's in that pattern, 0:08:59.440 --> 0:09:02.360 is in the records, so you can actually go and 0:09:02.360 --> 0:09:03.680 look at it. And if you look at it, you'll 0:09:03.679 --> 0:09:06.000 see it is not a tumble dryer. It's not the 0:09:06.040 --> 0:09:09.440 same style as posh on. So that tells me something else. 0:09:09.480 --> 0:09:11.600 It tells me that some of the websites that I 0:09:11.679 --> 0:09:14.360 pulled up while I was doing this just didn't go 0:09:14.559 --> 0:09:17.160 and look at the patents. They just reported it as 0:09:17.200 --> 0:09:20.160 being like this was an improvement on that tumble dryer, 0:09:20.200 --> 0:09:26.080 And uh, always go that extra step. I'm saying that 0:09:26.120 --> 0:09:27.840 to all of our listeners because I expect that they 0:09:28.160 --> 0:09:30.800 will occasionally have to write things like if you're a student, 0:09:30.840 --> 0:09:32.600 you may have to write a paper. This is why 0:09:32.920 --> 0:09:34.760 taking that extra step, Like if you just find a 0:09:34.760 --> 0:09:36.640 web page that says it's about that stuff, see if 0:09:36.640 --> 0:09:39.480 you can find a primary source, because it's always going 0:09:39.520 --> 0:09:42.200 to give you a better idea of what the real 0:09:42.280 --> 0:09:47.720 story n Then we have a patent by Seward H. 0:09:47.920 --> 0:09:52.200 Davis for his clothes drying machine. And it's interesting. So 0:09:52.280 --> 0:09:56.240 now he's decided to incorporate an oven directly into the 0:09:56.320 --> 0:09:59.800 device to generate heat. So we're still creating an oven. 0:10:00.040 --> 0:10:03.560 It's pre heating air because obviously an oven's not going 0:10:03.600 --> 0:10:05.560 to generate heat at the speed where you could just 0:10:05.600 --> 0:10:08.160 blow air across it and it's going to be hot, right, 0:10:08.760 --> 0:10:11.000 so you would. But he also incorporate a motor in 0:10:11.080 --> 0:10:13.080 his It was a motor that was connected by pulleys 0:10:13.080 --> 0:10:15.160 to a rotating drum, so going back to that post 0:10:15.280 --> 0:10:17.640 on approach, right, and it would rotate in one direction 0:10:17.679 --> 0:10:20.280 for a few turns and then go back the other way. Yeah, 0:10:20.360 --> 0:10:23.840 because according to Davis, you didn't want to continuously rotated 0:10:23.840 --> 0:10:26.040 in one direction or else the clothes would become hopelessly 0:10:26.160 --> 0:10:28.920 entangled with one another, and uh, it would just end 0:10:29.000 --> 0:10:31.160 up being a big mess. So his design had it 0:10:31.200 --> 0:10:32.920 where it would rotate one way then the other, and 0:10:32.920 --> 0:10:36.360 that would prevent the clothes from getting, yeah, from clumping 0:10:36.360 --> 0:10:40.400 and getting all like super friendly inside the dryer. You 0:10:40.480 --> 0:10:42.760 want your clothes to be a little bit antagonistic, Yeah, 0:10:42.800 --> 0:10:46.000 you don't. You don't want any fraternization inside the tumblers. 0:10:46.040 --> 0:10:49.319 What I'm saying, um, so yeah, pretty interesting. And then 0:10:49.360 --> 0:10:51.679 he also he also specifically pointed out in the pattern 0:10:51.840 --> 0:10:54.480 that the whole idea was to allow the clothes to fall, 0:10:54.600 --> 0:10:57.400 to tumble, like you didn't want to just spin and 0:10:57.440 --> 0:11:00.319 try and force the water out, but to tumble, because 0:11:00.320 --> 0:11:02.840 that tumbling motion would have it go through that hot 0:11:02.880 --> 0:11:05.839 air and thus evaporate the water much more quickly, pushing 0:11:05.840 --> 0:11:07.960 the air through it. And therefore sure, yeah, yeah, kind 0:11:07.960 --> 0:11:12.520 of cool. Nine Henry Sieben he attempts a different approach. 0:11:12.600 --> 0:11:14.760 His patent has a closed dryer that is more like 0:11:14.800 --> 0:11:19.000 a heated cabinet with wire shelving inside it. So imagine 0:11:19.000 --> 0:11:21.480 that you have like a little like cabinet or closet 0:11:21.840 --> 0:11:24.360 and it's got wire shelves, and you put the clothes 0:11:24.520 --> 0:11:27.400 on the shelves, and then you have an electric fan 0:11:27.480 --> 0:11:31.160 that draws air through the machine, which allowed for faster drying. Now, 0:11:31.160 --> 0:11:34.440 he didn't specifically include an element that with heat air, 0:11:34.840 --> 0:11:37.520 but you would presumably have this near some sort of 0:11:37.559 --> 0:11:39.920 other device that would heat the air, like a stove. 0:11:40.640 --> 0:11:42.640 So this cabinet would just pull the air through, which 0:11:42.640 --> 0:11:44.880 would circulate through the clothes, so kind of similar to 0:11:45.160 --> 0:11:49.040 Seward H. Davis's approach of tumbling, but they're stationary, so 0:11:49.040 --> 0:11:53.160 it's just pulling the air. So again this another idea 0:11:53.200 --> 0:11:57.240 that becomes important in uh in modern day dryers. So 0:11:57.720 --> 0:11:59.800 the important thing to remember here is the fan that 0:12:00.040 --> 0:12:03.240 holes the air through. These are all various elements, the 0:12:03.280 --> 0:12:06.120 tumbler pulling the air through. These are all things that 0:12:06.160 --> 0:12:08.480 are going to come into play with the modern day dryers. 0:12:09.120 --> 0:12:11.280 Now you still had to preheat the air though with 0:12:11.360 --> 0:12:14.520 something like a stove. Then we get to nineteen thirty seven. 0:12:14.520 --> 0:12:18.000 Now here's the guy that most people credit as Yeah, 0:12:18.480 --> 0:12:21.880 although again the citations different from what I was able 0:12:21.920 --> 0:12:25.240 to find. Okay, see, because he filed for a patent 0:12:25.320 --> 0:12:28.800 in ninety seven, this is James are more James right? 0:12:28.960 --> 0:12:34.120 Thank you? Um, it wasn't granted until, which we suspect 0:12:34.200 --> 0:12:36.679 World War two probably had something to do, had other 0:12:36.679 --> 0:12:39.440 stuff on their minds, right, the patent office was probably drafted. 0:12:39.960 --> 0:12:43.840 Uh So yeah, seven is the filing and is the 0:12:43.840 --> 0:12:46.640 awarding makes perfect sense. But it was for a closed 0:12:46.679 --> 0:12:49.440 drying machine. And this is the basis for closed dryers 0:12:49.480 --> 0:12:52.280 as we now know them. And so he what he 0:12:52.320 --> 0:12:55.200 did was he added applying heated air that didn't need 0:12:55.240 --> 0:12:57.880 to be preheated in an oven. He wanted to have 0:12:57.960 --> 0:13:01.000 a heating element either a gas hour or electric and 0:13:01.120 --> 0:13:04.440 in fact would eventually create both types. Right. He He 0:13:04.480 --> 0:13:07.439 also created a ventilation system so that air can can 0:13:07.520 --> 0:13:09.800 move through the dryer and then exhaust out of it, 0:13:09.960 --> 0:13:12.000 carrying that water vapor out. So you see, this is 0:13:12.000 --> 0:13:15.600 the combination of that rotating drum and that idea of 0:13:15.640 --> 0:13:20.440 the cabin exactly. So by combining the two, he has 0:13:20.520 --> 0:13:22.320 the best approach. And in fact, you could tell us 0:13:22.360 --> 0:13:24.440 the best approach because it's the one that lasted the 0:13:24.440 --> 0:13:29.199 test of time. So yeah, he uh as often cited 0:13:29.280 --> 0:13:32.080 in a lot of the websites we saw as having 0:13:32.160 --> 0:13:35.840 patented this this approach as early as nineteen thirty. But 0:13:35.960 --> 0:13:39.120 I went to the patent office, I mean online to 0:13:39.160 --> 0:13:42.880 the patent office. He didn't like, you didn't go there. 0:13:43.120 --> 0:13:45.160 I didn't actually take a trip to the patent office. 0:13:45.280 --> 0:13:48.520 I think they probably would have thrown the out of 0:13:48.520 --> 0:13:50.080 the patent off. They were like, how did you find 0:13:50.080 --> 0:13:52.000 your way in here? And I was like, I'd like 0:13:52.080 --> 0:13:55.600 to see your archives from nineteen thirty. Yeah, that probably 0:13:55.640 --> 0:13:57.600 would not have gone over. Well, they said, you've heard 0:13:57.720 --> 0:14:00.920 of the internet, right, Well, you can actually do searches 0:14:01.040 --> 0:14:03.600 online on the patent office. Google has a great patent 0:14:03.800 --> 0:14:06.160 search function, but you can also go to the U 0:14:06.280 --> 0:14:08.320 S Patent Office and use their search function. I use 0:14:08.400 --> 0:14:10.680 both because I could not find it in one, so 0:14:10.720 --> 0:14:14.160 I wanted to try both versions. You need to find 0:14:14.200 --> 0:14:17.880 a keywords pretty pretty acutely. Yeah, but it but it's 0:14:18.240 --> 0:14:21.120 it's a little more forgiving. But with the US one 0:14:21.360 --> 0:14:24.800 you can find everything listed in chronological order, whereas with 0:14:24.840 --> 0:14:28.280 Google you get it by order of relevance to your query. 0:14:28.360 --> 0:14:30.520 So in other words, you might see the first one 0:14:30.560 --> 0:14:32.400 pop up and say nineteen forty five, and the next 0:14:32.400 --> 0:14:34.160 one says nineteen twenty seven, and the next one says 0:14:34.240 --> 0:14:36.040 nineteen eighty three, and you're like, oh man, it's gonna 0:14:36.040 --> 0:14:38.400 take forever to find the oldest one. U S Patent 0:14:38.440 --> 0:14:41.240 does it chronologically, with the oldest being the last on 0:14:41.280 --> 0:14:44.120 the list. I went through both. The earliest I can 0:14:44.160 --> 0:14:46.960 find was nineteen thirty seven as a filing date, let 0:14:46.960 --> 0:14:49.200 alone a patent granted date, So I have no idea 0:14:49.280 --> 0:14:52.320 where they pulled this date of nineteen thirty They also 0:14:52.360 --> 0:14:54.600 said that he sold the patent in nineteen thirty six, 0:14:54.600 --> 0:14:56.600 but he didn't even file for a pat until nineteen 0:14:56.640 --> 0:14:59.920 thirty seven. I don't know where you get your informa 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:02.720 Asian Internet, so you should check it more carefully. Yeah, 0:15:02.720 --> 0:15:06.000 So anyway, he did file in nineteen thirty seven, and 0:15:06.040 --> 0:15:08.600 he did end up working with another company in nineteen 0:15:08.680 --> 0:15:12.560 thirty eight. That company would be the Hamilton's Manufacturing Company 0:15:12.640 --> 0:15:17.320 located in Two Rivers, Wisconsin, Pride and Joy of Wisconsin 0:15:17.520 --> 0:15:20.240 of Two Rivers, Wisconsin. Anyway, they actually have a museum 0:15:20.320 --> 0:15:26.200 dedicated to this former manufacturing company, and they used James R. 0:15:26.280 --> 0:15:29.560 Moore's design. They actually paid him for this, and they 0:15:29.760 --> 0:15:33.520 released in ninety eight the June Day Clothes Dryer based 0:15:33.520 --> 0:15:36.880 off this design. The early models used gas for heat 0:15:36.960 --> 0:15:38.960 to heat the heating element, so you'd have to like 0:15:39.040 --> 0:15:40.960 light the pilot light every time you wanted to dry 0:15:41.000 --> 0:15:43.280 a load of laundry, and then once you were done 0:15:43.360 --> 0:15:45.440 drying that load of laundry, should probably remember to blow 0:15:45.480 --> 0:15:47.320 it out. Yeah, you had to extinguish it or else 0:15:47.600 --> 0:15:51.240 you would just be wasting lots of gas or possibly 0:15:51.280 --> 0:15:54.240 creating a fire hazard, which, by the way, dryers big 0:15:54.280 --> 0:15:57.160 fire hazards. In general, do not run your dryer and 0:15:57.200 --> 0:16:00.440 then leave the house just in case. I mean, I 0:16:00.440 --> 0:16:03.040 don't want to scare anybody, but it is, but lint 0:16:03.080 --> 0:16:06.240 fires can happen. Yeah, so just a little word of 0:16:06.240 --> 0:16:08.400 caution in the middle of the episode. But yeah, later 0:16:08.480 --> 0:16:12.320 models were electric and they still created the gas ones too, 0:16:12.880 --> 0:16:17.440 but manufacturing was interrupted shortly after they started. They produced 0:16:17.440 --> 0:16:19.920 about six thousand of them and then stopped suddenly, all 0:16:19.920 --> 0:16:23.680 because of the event we have already referenced in this podcast, 0:16:23.680 --> 0:16:26.480 afore mentioned World War too. Yep, so World War two 0:16:26.600 --> 0:16:30.400 causes a manufacturer to stop. This was the case across 0:16:30.560 --> 0:16:33.800 multiple industries because yeah, the war effort needed all that 0:16:33.880 --> 0:16:37.280 material and and labor and a lot of the factory space. Yes, 0:16:37.440 --> 0:16:40.560 so all of that meant that dryers were not seen 0:16:40.640 --> 0:16:42.680 as being important to the war effort. It was put 0:16:42.680 --> 0:16:47.080 on hold. World War two was was over and the 0:16:47.120 --> 0:16:50.360 Hamilton's Manufacturing Company got back into this, but they were 0:16:50.400 --> 0:16:53.480 no longer the only game in town. By this time. 0:16:53.520 --> 0:16:57.920 Another big company, much bigger than Hamilton's Manufacturing actually got 0:16:57.960 --> 0:17:00.760 into the closed dryer game, and that would be General Electric. 0:17:01.520 --> 0:17:04.520 And so then it was off to the races, but 0:17:04.520 --> 0:17:07.960 but not not fast races and not not cheap races, no, 0:17:08.600 --> 0:17:13.840 incredibly expensive races, very very slow, expensive races. Around the 0:17:13.840 --> 0:17:17.320 same time, the first electric dryer to include a glass 0:17:17.359 --> 0:17:19.480 window in the front was introduced. And this is a 0:17:19.560 --> 0:17:22.000 design element, you know, it's it's it's just kind of 0:17:22.119 --> 0:17:23.919 nice to look at. But I wanted to mention it 0:17:23.960 --> 0:17:28.040 because it was designed by Brooks Stevens, who's another wisconsinite. 0:17:28.040 --> 0:17:32.480 He was a Wisconsin designer who also worked in in architecture, furniture, 0:17:32.480 --> 0:17:35.960 and auto design, including that greatest car of all, the 0:17:36.040 --> 0:17:41.119 Oscar Meyer Weenomobile. Man truly a visionary. We could do 0:17:41.160 --> 0:17:44.560 a full episode just on that. Actually I should mention 0:17:44.760 --> 0:17:47.080 all the inventors we've talked about have done some pretty 0:17:47.080 --> 0:17:52.200 phenomenal things besides inventing dryers. So but this, I mean, 0:17:52.560 --> 0:17:56.080 no one approached creating the Auscar Meer Wiener mobile aso. 0:17:56.880 --> 0:17:59.520 You know, we won't go back and fill those out 0:17:59.600 --> 0:18:02.639 nineteen fifty s. Well, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 0:18:02.840 --> 0:18:05.800 a dryer in the mid nineteen fifties cost about two 0:18:06.280 --> 0:18:09.480 thirty dollars, which if you adjust for inflation, would be 0:18:09.520 --> 0:18:12.879 closer to two thousand dollars for a dryer. Yes, so 0:18:13.000 --> 0:18:16.160 not a whole lot of people could afford it. On um. 0:18:16.359 --> 0:18:19.360 I shall also point out that this same paper cited 0:18:19.400 --> 0:18:23.000 some of the erroneous sources that I mentioned earlier. Um, 0:18:23.280 --> 0:18:25.119 the ones that could not be supported by, say, the 0:18:25.119 --> 0:18:27.520 Patent Office. I guess the Bureau of Labor Statistics in 0:18:27.520 --> 0:18:33.560 the patent offices don't don't talk to each other frequently. Yeah, 0:18:33.720 --> 0:18:39.120 this inner departmental stress type thing. This was I had 0:18:39.160 --> 0:18:41.320 to include it. I mean, there are some crazy patents 0:18:41.320 --> 0:18:43.639 out there, y'all. If you if you ever have a 0:18:43.680 --> 0:18:46.320 really slow day and you just want to amuse yourself, 0:18:46.600 --> 0:18:50.000 just start typing random words into a Google patent search 0:18:50.480 --> 0:18:54.199 and then enjoy. But one of the crazy ones I 0:18:54.240 --> 0:18:58.480 found was filed by William C. Sholin and the title 0:18:58.480 --> 0:19:02.320 of the patent is hair drying attachment for clothes dryer. 0:19:02.760 --> 0:19:05.480 This this cannot be what I think it is. I mean, well, 0:19:06.119 --> 0:19:08.200 if you think it's you're putting your hair in a 0:19:08.200 --> 0:19:10.359 clothes dryer, it's not. But if you think it's a 0:19:10.480 --> 0:19:12.960 tube connected to your clothes dryer that's used as a 0:19:13.000 --> 0:19:16.679 hair dryer, it totally is. It's a tube using the 0:19:16.720 --> 0:19:20.520 heat from the the dryer. I guess, I guess. You know, 0:19:20.600 --> 0:19:23.600 it's good to conserve energy, and so if you're already 0:19:23.640 --> 0:19:27.760 creating that heat, you might as well, yeah, dryer your hair, 0:19:28.000 --> 0:19:31.120 even though even though you're mostly using steam at that point. Yeah, 0:19:31.280 --> 0:19:34.520 so the hair dryer. It's one of those where it's 0:19:34.560 --> 0:19:36.960 got like the whole thing that comes of the fad, 0:19:37.080 --> 0:19:40.320 the helmet. Yeah, I have no idea what those are called. 0:19:40.520 --> 0:19:43.800 My hair days are long over, but anyway, it would 0:19:43.800 --> 0:19:47.280 fit over the person's head and uh, and presumably dry 0:19:47.280 --> 0:19:50.520 it using the heat from the hair dryer. Um. I 0:19:50.560 --> 0:19:53.720 don't know how popular this invention was if it were 0:19:53.760 --> 0:19:57.080 ever actually uh, you know, built because just because something's 0:19:57.080 --> 0:19:59.680 patented doesn't mean that you're going to have real examples 0:19:59.680 --> 0:20:01.560 of it. But if you want to look this up, 0:20:01.880 --> 0:20:04.600 I got a treat for you. Here's the patent number. 0:20:04.760 --> 0:20:08.360 You can put into a search, three million, sixty four thousand, 0:20:08.560 --> 0:20:11.480 three hundred sixty and you can look at the illustrations. 0:20:11.960 --> 0:20:14.000 Depending upon the patent search you put in, you may 0:20:14.119 --> 0:20:16.520 or may not need to use the commas in that number. 0:20:16.560 --> 0:20:18.920 You just could put in the digits three zero six 0:20:18.920 --> 0:20:23.280 four zero. It's entertaining, but obviously I can't really show 0:20:23.320 --> 0:20:27.120 it on an audio podcast at any rate. In Um, 0:20:27.600 --> 0:20:31.960 a vacuum chamber related dryer was proposed. Yeah, William Lambert 0:20:32.000 --> 0:20:35.720 Chanley filed a patent for a drayer that would use 0:20:35.760 --> 0:20:38.800 a vacuum chamber. And this makes sense when you think 0:20:38.800 --> 0:20:41.679 about it, in the sense that in a vacuum, it 0:20:41.720 --> 0:20:45.880 takes less heat to evaporate water. Yeah, so if you're 0:20:45.920 --> 0:20:49.359 able to create a partial vacuum. We're not talking like 0:20:49.400 --> 0:20:51.920 a complete vacuum, but if you were able to create 0:20:51.960 --> 0:20:56.320 a partial vacuum within a dryer, then you could pressure 0:20:56.440 --> 0:20:58.600 and yeah, you don't have to heat up the air 0:20:58.640 --> 0:21:00.480 as much, so you don't have to pourse my energy 0:21:00.480 --> 0:21:02.560