|
Replies: 11
| visibility 651
|
CU Medallion [65645]
TigerPulse: 100%
Posts: 33294
Joined: 12/3/03
|
Random memory from my childhood just popped into my head. It was something
17
17
Apr 5, 2024, 12:28 PM
|
|
that modern kids will most likely never experience. Our farm had several "tenant" houses on it, where families of some of our farm workers lived. These houses did NOT have any sort of central heat or air conditioning systems. (Neither did OURS at the time!) What they used for heat was good old fashioned cast iron "Pot bellied" wood fired heaters, with pipes that went out the top or side of the house.
What brought up the memory was another poster making a joke about walking uphill in the snow both ways to and from school. Way back in those days, schools would also most likely have been heated by these same types of wood burning stoves.
The actual memory was, I and some of the kids on the farm were taking a break from playing outside in very cold weather, and went into their house to warm up by the heater. They had that thing going so strong that the exhaust was almost "cherry red" in places. Now, these pipes are almost as thin as tissue paper to begin with, and this one was so hot, you could literally see sparks moving along inside it! If I'm lying, I'm dying!
That brought up a cartoon I remember from back then, as well. The Eskimo comes into his igloo, and starts a fire in the wood heater. He is so cold, he is literally sitting on top of that thing in the beginning. But then, as wood heaters do, it started really "paying off", if you know what I mean. Next cartoon panel, the Eskimo is sitting thirty feet out in the snow with the igloo door open to get far enough away from the heat to be comfortable!
In the new house that my parents had built in 1977 after fire burned down our original one, they had a chimney with one of those "Black Bart" type fireplace inserts, even though they DID have central heat and air in the new house. My dad just HATED paying for electricity to heat the house when he could burn "free" wood from trees downed around the farm. So, it was not unusual when we would go visit in the winter to find them in the den with that thing going, and it would be about 95 degrees in that room, dry enough for nosebleeds, and the rest of the house would be about FIFTY!
|
|
|
|
 |
110%er [6861]
TigerPulse: 95%
Posts: 6503
Joined: 10/7/07
|
My grandparents had one of those fireplace inserts
7
7
Apr 5, 2024, 12:35 PM
|
|
My gosh did it put off the heat. You literally couldnt get near the thing.
|
|
|
|
|
|
CU Medallion [67946]
TigerPulse: 100%
Posts: 115518
Joined: 11/30/98
|
Re: Random memory from my childhood just popped into my head. It was something
8
8
Apr 5, 2024, 12:45 PM
|
|
My grandparents had an oil furnace with the one big grate in the floor. One time I was over there and accidentally dropped one of my green plastic army men in the grate and it began to melt. I was a very unpopular grandkid at that point
|
|
|
|
|
|
CU Medallion [65645]
TigerPulse: 100%
Posts: 33294
Joined: 12/3/03
|
The first house that my wife and I bought from my great uncle's family had one
6
6
Apr 5, 2024, 12:55 PM
|
|
of those things. We had to use it, as that and a gas heater mounted in a chimney in the living room were the only source of heat for the whole house. I rednecked it up, though, cutting a rectangular hole above the doorway on one side, and mounting a double Martin electric fan in the opening. If you shut that door then, and left the doors to other rooms open, the fans would pull the heat all the way around the house inside.
Like you said, though, the grates on that thing got hot enough to melt sneakers if you stood on it. Don't ask me how I know that.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Orange Blooded [4572]
TigerPulse: 100%
Posts: 3143
Joined: 9/4/03
|
I'm not that old, but...
5
5
Apr 5, 2024, 1:17 PM
|
|
I do remember melting crayons on the radiators in elementary school in the 70s.
|
|
|
|
|
|
All-TigerNet [11089]
TigerPulse: 100%
Posts: 4992
Joined: 10/31/03
|
Re: Random memory from my childhood just popped into my head. It was something
5
5
Apr 5, 2024, 1:27 PM
|
|
I had a big fire going in the stove last night. It put me to sleep in my chair. I woke up to find three cats strecthed out in various poses sound alseep on the couch, footstool, and hearth. Too hot for the dog. She was in the hallway.
I keep the ceiling fan on reverse to push the heat out of the den and into the other rooms.
|
|
|
|
|
|
CU Guru [1120]
TigerPulse: 93%
Posts: 766
Joined: 12/11/13
|
Re: Random memory from my childhood just popped into my head. It was something
6
6
Apr 5, 2024, 1:34 PM
|
|
My memory was having and iron stove in the living room with a door you had to open with a rag or glove when it was hot. We heated with coal at the time. As a kid in the winter you put on your Galoshes (for anyone not knowing what these were) they were oversized boots with several buckles running up the front to hook and lock to keep them in place. We would load up a coal pail and take inside to stoke up the stove. Also when it was cold a blanket or cover was pinned to the door facing going into the kitchen then the stove oven was cut on to warm that room. Other than that anywhere else in the house you would be chilled to the bone. Ah yes, the good old days and we survived. Good times and good memories.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Oculus Spirit [90820]
TigerPulse: 100%
Posts: 45503
Joined: 10/18/09
|
In 1962-66 our WW2 Clemson prefab had 1 kerosene
6
6
Apr 5, 2024, 1:58 PM
|
|
heater in LR and we put a pot of water on top to get some moisture going and a small fan to blow the heat into the other 3 rooms and a space heater in the Bath Room in the mornings.
Also, we dried clothes near it on a fold-out clothes rack.
A new way to stay warm & dry clothes for this newly wed couple but we survived and Miss those days where the school paid $1 hour for help but the rent was only $38 and a movie ticket was about .50 cents.
|
|
|
|
|
|
1st Rounder [628]
TigerPulse: 100%
Posts: 792
Joined: 10/27/15
|
Re: In 1962-66 our WW2 Clemson prefab had 1 kerosene
Apr 5, 2024, 5:54 PM
|
|
Our prefab on Armstrong heated the same way. Luckily I’d grown up with one and knew how to light it with a straightened out clothes hanger and a kleanex. It was fairly common up and down the street for the newlywed young ladies to come home in the afternoon and light the stove with too much kerosene in it and then close the door with the damper wide open. Door would vibrate while sucking air and sound like a jet engine reving up on the runway at St. Marteen. Fire department would arrive and excitement would ensue. By the way, I don’t remember my bride and I having any problems staying warm at nite. I do remember Keri being 25 cents a gallon and the fuel oil company coming and pumping out 15 gallons before we left in August.
|
|
|
|
|
|
110%er [6919]
TigerPulse: 100%
Posts: 9202
Joined: 7/11/03
|
I definitely can relate.***
4
Apr 5, 2024, 1:57 PM
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
CU Guru [1511]
TigerPulse: 100%
Posts: 1011
Joined: 1/16/02
|
Re: Random memory from my childhood just popped into my head. It was something
Apr 5, 2024, 5:04 PM
|
|
My dad and I built a wood burning stove and put it in the fireplace when I was a kid 12ish
I had already learned to weld by that age and did most of the welding on it for practice.
Heated the house with it for years because they had ceiling radiant electric heat and my mom hated paying for electricity.
The key is to crack a window farthest away from stove and draw the heat across the house
Had a lot of fun cutting wood with my dad over those years.
|
|
|
|
|
|
110%er [8282]
TigerPulse: 100%
Posts: 3933
Joined: 9/11/08
|
Re: Random memory from my childhood just popped into my head. It was something
Apr 5, 2024, 5:36 PM
|
|
Who needs alumni memories when we’ve got tnet
|
|
|
|
|
|
Replies: 11
| visibility 651
|
|
|
50
