Relaxing in the 1930s with an Electro-Cooler

When I stumbled on this image of a billboard from the 1930s on the Duke University site, my eye was caught by the term "Electro-Cooler. I've never been to Fresno, California, but I imagine it gets hot there in the summer, and this must have been wonderful to have.

It does leave me with a bit of a question as to whether it was the equivalent of what makes my life so pleasant here in the Phoenix, Arizona area: Air Conditioning. And up until fairly recently, the term Air Conditioning (or A/C as we locals call it) wasn't exactly clear. In fact, it was called "Refrigeration" for quite a while, which differentiated it from just fans blowing across a pad with water (which was usually called "Swamp Cooling").

It really got so bad, at least here in Phoenix, that hotels would advertise "Air Cooled", which implied true Air Conditioning, but would actually only be Swamp Cooling. Of course, the fan was run with electricity, so I would still be suspicious of the term "electro". Buyer beware! Of course nowadays I can go Google it, and I probably will, but right now I'm imagining that it's the 1930s during a heat wave in Fresno and I'm looking at this billboard, wondering what this was. The engineers at the California-Fresno Oil Company would know!

I like the way the cartoon guy is sitting, slouched in his chair, with a smile on his face. You can almost picture how hot it was, maybe even hot enough for him to take off his coat and tie. He's holding a newspaper in one hand and a pipe in the other.

Ah... Electro-Cooling! Summer comfort!

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