Claiming "a decrease in the danger of suffering carbon-monoxide poisoning" the November 1933 issue of Popular Science prophesied that " the car of the future [will be] provided with air conditioning as standard equipment." This week has made us especially thankful that this prophecy was fulfilled -- the air conditioning and the decrease in carbon-monoxide poisoning!
In 1933, the refrigerant and compressor system was what we today call, an after-market product. It was added to the car and placed under the floor in the rear compartment. The product was based on technology that had been experimented with since 1902 when Willis Carrier developed a system to remove humidity from the print shop where he worked. (Yep, the guy whose name remains on many air conditioning units today.) You can read the Popular Science article about air conditioned cars at Google Books -- https://goo.gl/QQHq2H. And, you can just give Willis a kind thought the next time you climb into your car on a hot summer day!
Learn more about Willis Carrier and the history of air conditioning at http://www.williscarrier.com/
Information for this blog based excerpts from "First Air-Conditioned Auto" from the November 1933 Popular Science Monthly as presented on Google Books.
Images from Popular Science, November 1933.
