[permaculture] conventional fireplaces

David Kahn david at sustainablehabitats.org
Sun Oct 14 02:16:08 EDT 2007


Greetings to all,
Just to confirm what Scott and Toby posted, here is what Mark Twain 
wrote way back:

*SOME NATIONAL STUPIDITIES*

*(1891-1892)*

*/"THE slowness of one section of the world about adopting the valuable 
ideas of another section of it is a curious thing and unaccountable. 
This form of stupidity is confined to no community, to no nation; it is 
universal. The fact is the human race is not only slow about borrowing 
valuable ideas--it sometimes persists in not borrowing them at all./*

*/Take the German stove, for instance--the huge white porcelain monument 
that towers toward the ceiling in the corner of the room, solemn, 
unsympathetic, and suggestive of death and the grave-- where can you 
find it outside of the German countries? I am sure I have never seen it 
where German was not the language of the region. Yet it is by long odds 
the best stove and the most convenient and economical that has yet been 
invented.^
<http://www.questia.com/read/55468744#1>/*

*/To the uninstructed stranger it promises nothing; but he will soon 
find that it is a masterly performer, for all that. It has a little bit 
of a door which you couldn't get your head into--a door. which seems 
foolishly out of proportion to the rest of the edifice; yet the door is 
right, for it is not necessary that bulky fuel shall enter it. 
Small-sized fuel is used, and ma/*r/*velously little at that.  The door 
opens into a tiny cavern which would not hold more fuel that a baby 
could fetch in its arms.  The process of firing is quick and simple.  At 
half past seven on a cold morning the servant brings a small basketful 
of slender pine sticks - say a modified armful - and puts half these in, 
lights them with a match, and closes the door.  They burn out in ten or 
twelve minutes.  He then puts in the rest and locks the door, and 
carries off the key.  The work is done.  He will not come again until 
the next morning.
     All day long and until past midnight all parts of the room will be 
delightfully warm and comfortable, and there will be no headaches and no 
sense of closeness or oppression.  In an American room, whether heated 
by steam, hot water, or open fires, the neighborhood of the register or 
the fireplace is warmest - the heat is not equally diffused throughout 
the room; but in a German room one is as comfortable in one part of it 
as in another.  Nothing is gained or lost by being near the stove.  Its 
surface is not hot; you can put your hand on it anywhere and not get burnt.
    Consider these things.  One firing is enough for the day; the cost 
is next to nothing; the heat produced is the same all day, instead of 
too hot and too cold by turns; one may absorb himself in his business 
and peace; he does not need to feel any anxieties or solicitudes about 
his fire; his whole day is a realized dream of bodily comfort.
    
America could adopt this stove, but does America do it?  The American 
wood stove, of whatsoever breed, it is a terror.  There can be no 
tranquility of mind where it is.  It requires more attention than a 
baby.  It has to be fed every little while, it has to be watched all the 
time; and for all reward you are roasted half your time and frozen the 
other half.  It warms no part of the room but its own part; it breeds 
headaches and suffocation, and makes one's skin feel dry and feverish; 
and when your wood bill comes in you thin you have been supporting a 
volcano.
     We have in America many and many a breed of coal stove also - 
fiendish things, everyone of them.  The base burner sort are heady and 
require but little attention; but none of them distributes its heat 
uniformly through the room, or keeps it at an unwavering temperature, or 
fails to take the life out of the atmosphere and leave it stuffy and 
smothery and stupefying..."
*From "Europe and Elsewhere"  by Mark Twain/

Posted By:
David Kahn
www.sustainablehabitats.org
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