Latest / Ruining the Workplace Podcast / EP 5 Alice Parker Ruins HVAC
Transcript
- Jaden: I'm Jaden and this is the Ruining the Workplace podcast. Danielle: and I'm Danielle. Jaden: We're back! We're so back. Danielle: We are back. We're back, baby. Jaden: ⁓ Danielle: Listeners may not realize that we took a little hiatus, but we're back. We had to. Jaden: Yeah, we had to. It was a rough winter. We needed to come back to ⁓ ourselves ⁓ a few things off our plate and get our heads straight again. at least to a more comfortable place, at least for me. ⁓ I was, Danielle: Absolutely. you know, honestly, springtime is my most productive season. It's when I often make a lot of changes in life. And so this makes sense that like we took some of the winter off and it's nice out. It's like 70 here today. The cows are out by the creek. They're voluptuous. Many of the cows are pregnant right now. So they're very voluptuous. It's just a good season. Jaden: Mm. ⁓ Hoo. You Danielle: You know, so it's a good season to get back into our podcast. Jaden: that I, baby cows for days. I love that. Danielle: I know I can't wait. Jayden, what is new with you? What does your springtime look like? What's going on in your world? Jaden: Ooh, well, it's really, the weather's been delightful the PNW where I am. So that's just been great because ⁓ sads are going away, you know? ⁓ that I am so grateful for. And ⁓ have been dealing with this chronic hip pain for the past long ass time. Let's just say that. Danielle: Yeah. Eww. ⁓ no. Jaden: It's gone now just turns out it was this like stupid muscle that apparently attaches from your knee to your SI joint and if it gets too tight it will like fuck up your whole life. So managed to fix that this weekend and now I'm like a whole new woman. It is crazy. So. Danielle: Oh my God. That's amazing. So have you had to do like repeated like physical therapy type stuff or was it like, hey, he figured out the thing. And if he snaps your leg like a Barbie doll this way, you know what I mean? Jaden: kind of one of those moments where it was like, ⁓ my god, it was that. That's crazy. And so yeah, it was like, I've done all these different things and tried so many different things. And then I injured my knee the last couple of weeks. And then that turned out to be the rabbit hole I needed to go down to fix everything else. So now I'm like, I can get up off the floor, you guys. It's, I think I added 20 years back onto my life. So. Danielle: Hmm. Amazing! And I promise we're not a thousand years old. Jaden: I feel 1,000 years old most days, but now I feel 980 years old. I just did math on the fly. All right, let's get to it. Yes. Danielle: Amazing, amazing. Let's get to it in other witchcraft. Okay. So ⁓ it didn't occur to me until right now ⁓ ⁓ is springtime and the story that we're going to tell or that I'm going to tell ⁓ ⁓ heat so kind of interesting. I have all my windows open today, but I'm going to tell you a story about central heating. ⁓ As it warms up, let me warm up some history for you. So today, we're going to step back in time and learn a little bit about heat, how we keep our homes and our offices warm and functioning well, and who we have to thank, ultimately, for our modern HVAC system. bear with me, we're going to go a little bit of a journey where we're going to learn about heat, and then we'll talk about the person, But what do you know about heating systems and how we keep our houses warm and whatnot? Jaden: Let's go. ⁓ I know that I tend to go into a pretty deep spiral if my HVAC stops working. That is what I know. And I have ⁓ central air in my home for the first time in maybe my whole life. This is first house I've ever had it. So it's awesome. But ⁓ that's all I really know about it. Danielle: Yeah. I mean, honestly, that's fine. I ⁓ went down a bit of a rabbit hole and I feel like I maybe don't understand more, but I have heard more about heating than I would have expected. But what we're going to do today is dive into a little bit about the history of heating and how we kept our homes warm throughout And then ⁓ story of a woman named Alice Parker. She was a black inventor from New Jersey and we have her to thank for our modern heating system. Have you heard of her at all, Jayden? Jaden: No, but I'm really excited to learn about her because this whole buildup is like really, I'm like, where is this going? This is really fascinating. So yes, welcome Alice to the podcast. Danielle: my God. Yay. so in the early 1900s, the primary sources of heat were wood or coal. Most homes would use fireplaces or stoves to burn off both of these sources. And ⁓ one of the results of that, you know, ⁓ It provides warmth for sure, but it provides inconsistent heat throughout the home. So rooms would vary widely. If you're not right in front of the fireplace, obviously it's cooler, right? You're going to feel the drafts come in. You're not getting like the direct heat on you, but that's just how heating systems worked. As time went on through the early 1900s, the heating system that we Somewhat use today like a furnace and duct work like you have a furnace in your maybe your basement if you live in a place that has basements ⁓ ducks that run throughout your house. ⁓ That had been invented, ⁓ with steam heat using a boiler so that's when you start to see kind of radiator show up right so we're moving away from fireplaces or a furnace to hey we have a stove hey we have a furnace in a room, we have duct work that spreads it throughout then someone layered in steam heat. using a boiler so that furnace would heat up water in the boiler. It would then push steam through tubes or the duct work and have it come out through radiators. this was pretty common in urban areas or areas like offices and school buildings, right? So where there's a higher concentration of people, that technology was pretty well adopted, but it hadn't reached widespread adoption just yet. So now we're into the ⁓ mid ⁓ 1900s. It was being installed in new buildings, but wasn't adopted. Like I live in a very rural area. I would guess that we didn't have that technology yet, right? At the time it was added on much later. ⁓ But another problem is when you're using steam ⁓ rooms had have those radiators that I was talking about, That controls the steam release. So it's not necessarily the vents that you might have today, like from your central air, right? You have, you're operating just on your radiators. And many homes today still use radiant heat. That's pretty common in older homes. And you might have an air conditioning system added on that does use vents. it's not all of the vents that we have today and it still doesn't provide as consistent of heat as maybe one would ideally want, It's very concentrated to where the radiator is. You can't aim it at things. You can't adjust it in that way. So while we have steam heat at this time, so we're kind of around the early 1900s, 1918, let's say. We have steam heat. It's kind of taking off. It's being used pretty frequently, but the primary sources were still wood and coal. So today, a lot of us have gas heat, right? And some folks might still augment with wood ⁓ but ⁓ we weren't gas as the primary source of heat. Gas had been ⁓ installed to power electricity the 1800s, but no one had thought, hey, can we use this? I shouldn't say no one had thought. But no one had come up with a solid plan to use it to heat homes as well until our girl Alice decides to come up with a solution. So she created essentially the blueprint for modern forced air heating systems. And that's essentially using gas to pump into a furnace and using that to push out heat, usually still steam So in her design, there's a pump that pulls in natural gas burners and ducts that would then lead to individual rooms. So that gives you a little bit more control. It's heating your entire house. The vents in each room could then be controlled, right, individually. So if I want to close off this room or if I want to aim the heat somewhere specific into the room, you have a little bit more control. She got a patent for her design in December of 1919 and she was, guess is about 24 years old at the time, which is amazing. Like I can't imagine myself as a 24 year old coming up with anything that could vastly change the world like that. I mean, can you imagine like what? ⁓ Jaden: I mean, go ⁓ on. Danielle: That's all. So, so she gets this patent and while it's not immediately manufactured, like they don't immediately start making the Alice version of heating or Alice furnace, it is considered the predecessor to our modern heating systems and our AC systems or AC units. Jaden: I have questions. we really dug into Alice herself yet. So these are more like questions about heating, which is not the most fascinating Sorry, I'm not trying to exclude HVAC listeners out there because we have probably a lot. ⁓ Anyway, ⁓ I thinking steam heat. And as soon as you said steam heat, of course, I thought of Lois Griffin singing steam heat. ⁓ Have you ever that on Family Guy? ⁓ Danielle: I don't know what you were talking about. Jaden: God, you should look it up. It's funny because she's like anyway, she just sings a song called Steam Heat and then she says, and I need your love to keep away the cold. it's all I could think of. Danielle: Okay, amazing. Thank you. That was amazing, first of all. Jaden: So secondly, and more seriously, ⁓ I was curious about the steam heat thing. And if you happen to read anything about steam heat, I had to wonder, because the time frame you're talking about, this is like typhoid and cholera and, well, cholera, guess, isn't a lung disease, but tuberculosis and stuff, and all of these respiratory things that were going. And I'm like, steam heat, interesting. Danielle: Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ my god. Jaden: I wonder if there's like a correlation there, just... There probably is, but I'm just so curious. Danielle: I don't know. That's such a good question. I have no idea. so as I was doing my research for this, and I hope no like HVAC experts come after us because I'm sure I got things not quite right, right? But I didn't see anything related to that. I bet if we dug deeper, you might see more around. Jaden: Yeah. Danielle: Like, what are the implications of that, right? Like, I know if you are relying on fireplaces, you are filling with soot. You know what I mean? Like, it's messy and it's smoky. You know what I mean? So I would wonder if steam has a similar effect. Jaden: Yes, yeah, exactly. Yeah, especially because I would imagine in the earlier versions of home heated by steam systems, they're not thinking about exhaust as much. They don't know. have to trial and error everything, right? So I'm curious how much impact that had on, ⁓ we're not, Danielle: Great. Yeah. Jaden: Anyway, this is going way off the rails. is the Alice furnace a real thing? Like, there something called that? Darn it. OK. Danielle: I love it. No, no, that was my name for it. There is, there is a real patent and, I'll get into this. Well, I'll say it now and we can talk about it again later. She does have an actual patent. Like if you look it up, it's there. And I suspect that the only reason we know anything about her is probably because someone was going in to make a new furnace and discovered her existing patent. That would be my guess because when we transitioned to talking about the history of her, there's not a ton that anybody knows about her. ⁓ So while there, yeah, there's no Alice furnace, there is a design for an Alice furnace. And, and I wondered like, is that the only reason we know? You know what I mean? Like nothing else was really documented. Jaden: Okay, go on. Danielle: All right, well, let's talk a little bit about Alice. So as I said, there's not a ton that is known about her. What we do know is that she is from New Jersey. She is a graduate of Howard University. She graduated with honors in 1910. And apparently, and this is from Howard University's own blog, there's no clearly documented like. she graduated with this degree. And maybe this isn't how degrees worked in the time, but it's hypothesized that her area of study was STEM or engineering because of the patent. ⁓ there's no, ⁓ least no one that I saw was referencing, like she graduated with a degree in, you know, electrical engineering in 1910. It was just, hey, she graduated with honors in 1910. We believe she studied these things because she has this patent, which I find very interesting. But that could be a record keeping thing from the time, right? So she the idea for the furnace because lived in New Jersey and ⁓ her noticed in their home, they were having a really hard time keeping kind of consistent heat throughout the house, right? Like how do we keep all of these rooms warm ⁓ or temperature that we want? And that inspired her to try something new. There's nothing else documented about her really. We know that she graduated and then a few years later up with this design for a new heating system, ⁓ got her patent, then many records indicate that she died the next year ⁓ in 1920. ⁓ even that, so young, I ⁓ And even that a little bit contested, like truly. ⁓ Jaden: So young, like. Danielle: When I say that, the only thing we really know that is widely known about her is that she invented this furnace. Like, that's the thing, because people are even arguing, like, did she die then or did she die at a different time? But it seems to be ⁓ consensus is that she died very young, ⁓ after receiving her patent. So I think, you know, a lot of it ties back to ⁓ keeping in that time, but also she was a Black woman. So. ⁓ an additional lack of record keeping and healthcare access to that demographic at the time, I'm sure was not great, right? And so I think all of these contribute to, we don't know a ton about her, but she is widely attributed as kind of the pioneer of our heating system that we have today, which I think is super cool. And I wish that we knew more or like that she had family members, you know what I mean? Or like somebody to track down. ⁓ And maybe if we were like a big budget network or something, we could do more homework on it. gosh, this would be a great movie. Jaden: Mm-hmm. Someday. except for it seems like it's gonna have a sad ending, because she kind of has her like come up and then she dies. What did she die of? What do we know? Danielle: Well, yeah, I know. I know. I know. I don't know. I couldn't find out. So do you remember when I Marco Polo'd you the other day with like, I was so excited and I'm running up against the dead end. It was this. And I'm like, but you know, like as I thought about it over the weekend, I'm like, I'm going to run with it because there's not a lot known, but I think there's a really good lesson here and a really interesting story around Jaden: ⁓ yes! Danielle: like who gets credit for their work? How do we give credit to people for their work? And I was actually really impressed and a little bit surprised to like how easy it was to find what little information I did find about her. Like these random heating companies have blogs that will reference her. And I'm like, ⁓ I would not have expected that. You know what I mean? Like, ⁓ that's very cool that you're at least paying due, you know, where it's needed. Jaden: Mm-hmm. That is really cool. it was gas fireplace, or gas furnace, I mean. That was, OK, specifically gas furnace. ⁓ that's cool. Danielle: Yeah. Yeah, specifically gas. And so gas hadn't been used at the time. So she was pulling on, we have a furnace. We maybe have a boiler. We have this ductwork. But why aren't we using gas to kind of streamline that process? And that's where we start to get beyond my HVAC understanding. Like, I watched a whole video on YouTube the other night about this. And I'm like, this is a lot. Jaden: Mm, yeah. Danielle: Like you could take a class just in this. But it's, cool. Like I would love to know more about, you know, are there other things that she invented that maybe didn't get patents or maybe did, you know, but we just don't know about it or, know, what else was she working on? I saw some speculation that she was maybe a cook for like a wealthy family in the area. And like that was her like traditional job. Which is then crazy to think like, you graduated from a major university and you're out here inventing shit and then you have to go cook for somebody else. ⁓ Jaden: I know. I mean, yeah. ⁓ And then it probably was incredibly difficult. I mean, it sucks that her life was so short because, I mean, this could have. Danielle: crazy. Mm-hmm. Jaden: and probably was very impactful for her and her family. I would be curious like what that sort of legacy looked like in terms of did her family sort of continue? I mean, gas furnaces, they're obviously a thing now. I'm just like, how did it move from there after, you know, just sell the patent and then it goes and companies make the thing or, you know, I'm just so curious like what that process is. Danielle: Yeah. Yeah. Like, I don't really fully understand how the patent system works, But if nobody was out making these furnaces, did she make any money from this? ⁓ know what I mean? And what we see today is places like the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce has established Jaden: Right, right. Danielle: a Women and Leaders Innovation Award in her name, but I don't, as far as I can tell, there was no financial tieback her or for her family. And I don't even know she was so young if she had children It's largely like her legacy is there's now awards or grants that are in her name, which is pretty cool, but also like, Jaden: Yeah. Danielle: Gosh, that's such a big invention. Jaden: Yeah, totally. Yeah, it's definitely one of those things that I think people take for granted. It's like my earlier story, what do you know about heat? Like, well, I get upset when it doesn't work in my house was my answer. we clearly take these things for granted. And so it's just kind of like, don't even, I mean, it takes like a crisis for us not having to actually carve out a new way of life to solve these kinds of problems. It's a very different thing. Danielle: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Right, ⁓ for sure! ⁓ for sure. Yeah, I mean, it's largely like accepted as like this invisible thing that just operates until it does it. And then you're like, fuck. Thanks. Yeah, for sure. So I'm curious, you know, now that we know as much of the story as we can, what stands out to you as like either the modern parallel or like what what can you what would you take away from this story? Jaden: Yeah. Right. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah, ⁓ So I I've been thinking about the quiet work ⁓ of a lot times women and how ⁓ this feels like one those weird. not intentionally, but just happenstance cases where it's like we assume that someone's going to just take care of something. It's like, ⁓ cool. OK, they did that. Now it's a thing. And now we're just talking about it of gets taken for granted. It's widely adopted. It's just a normal piece of life. But we don't really think about the quiet work that it took to get there. Danielle: Yeah. Yeah. Jaden: ⁓ And just the fact that this woman is, I mean, if you just do a Google search on Alice Parker, it's really interesting. And I can imagine your research on this was very like weaving a web a little bit because the sources are really scattered and a lot of them are conflicting. And it's like you can't even look at photos without it being like, wait, is this the right person? So I just. Danielle: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. ⁓ my gosh, isn't that wild? Sorry. The photo thing was insane. I'm like, wait, these are two different people. That's wild. Jaden: super wild. No it is! It's totally, Yeah. Right. I know and I'm like okay but then they're like, but then this one lady isn't actually her either and I'm like wait. So it's very interesting because it's such a monumental thing and we just don't even know how to... Danielle: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Jaden: It's sort of a thankless thing for this person who just sort of disappeared. And so I guess my, again, my modern parallel there is just a sort of quiet work that not just women, yes, I know, but a lot of times it is us sort of having to think of that, ⁓ got to do this and this and this this this and this. Otherwise it just won't get done. So I don't know. ⁓ Yeah, I think that's kind of what it brings up for me. Danielle: Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. I love that you talk about the quiet work and ⁓ in some ways the thankless work. ⁓ This is not thankless, right? In the end, it's very big deal, but to not get credit ⁓ or to not get credit in the moment, I guess, the thing. And part of that is due to, I'm sure, like some... you know, systemic racism and access to health care. And she was a woman. She was a black woman, you know, like there's a lot of systems at play. Like if you watch, will link to the YouTube video. But you watch it, it's it's all these old white dudes. ⁓ You what I mean? And like that's who had power. So in some ways it makes sense. But then you get to Alice and you're like, holy shit, what this very different, you know? And and so I can only imagine like. Jaden: Great. haha Yeah. Danielle: the suppression in some ways, you know, that maybe she received or maybe her patent received, I'm like, well, that's a woman's work. We're not gonna leverage that or whatever. What stood out to me, and what the quiet, behind the scenes work thing makes me think of is like, getting credit for your work when you can't, Like, I think about how I show up at work and like, it's not putting your name on things necessarily, but like, Jaden: Yeah. Yeah. Danielle: making sure that someone knows your ideas are yours, right? And this happens to women or when you're new and you're starting off, it's, you your boss might take your idea or a man will say the same thing that you said, but in a different way or anybody can do all of these things. And, and I think it's important for us to find a way to like document the things that we did and then to correct if someone is like miss assigning your ideas or your work. and obviously Alice can't do that, but Jaden: Mm-hmm. Danielle: when we think about our own work, if it's like, well, I had this idea, or hey, this was a thing I came up with. And I think about it a lot when it's time for an annual review, our favorite thing ever. And I think we've talked about this before of making note of your accomplishments throughout the year. But this kind of points to that of being able to say, I did this thing. I need you to acknowledge that and recognize that and not just Jaden: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm. Yes. Danielle: bypass it because it maybe was quiet work or something. Jaden: I love that you said that because that's related to my ruining the workplace tip of the week. Danielle: ⁓ What a great transition Jaden: Wow, that was amazing. Yeah, so you just said something about reminding ourselves about our own accomplishments. So my ruining the workplace tip the week ⁓ is every Friday, remember how got yourself to where you are and pat yourself on the back and do the same thing on Monday morning, you know, because ⁓ Danielle: Okay. Wow. Stop. I love that. Jaden: We all need to be kinder and speak more positively to ourselves, myself included. So ⁓ I think that the tail end of your story is a perfect example of, hey, recognize your accomplishments and be, use that as a superpower. Danielle: Amazing. I love that so much. feel like this is weird or whatever. That's like the message I needed to hear today. Jaden: This is Kismet. Danielle: It really is. That's great. Jaden: Yep. Well, ⁓ thanks for ⁓ being a baddie for yet another week. Danielle: Yes. ⁓ my gosh. Yes, thank you. This has been so fun. I can't wait to have our next discussion. And I'm so glad that we got to talk about Alice ruining HVAC systems. I never thought I would say anything about HVAC ever. Jaden: And this is the deepest into the topic I've ever been without paying someone else to be working on my furnace at the same time. Perfect. All right. Well, until next one, I'll see Danielle: Truly. Right? Yeah, exactly. one's for free. I'll do this work for free for you all. You're welcome. ⁓ Right. Bye.