The HVACR Heritage Centre has received approval for $114,625 in funding for an online documentary on the evolution of heating technologies, changing Canadian society and the economy through the 1900s. Titled: ‘Warming Up – Automated Heating and Social Change’, the Centre is asking for historic illustrations, photos, technical data, manuals, etc. on wood, coal, gas, oil or dual-fuel and electric automated boilers and furnaces for buildings, installed systems (including non-operating), during the late 19th and into the mid-20th Centuries.

 

Technical data such as dates of manufacture, location and installation, the manufacturer’s name from the name plate or catalogues would be helpful. Credits will be included for each contributor. Images of wood-coal stoves from the early 18th Century to the 20th Century in Canada will add to the historic sweep of this documentary, to be completed by December 2010. Take pictures before it is thrown out or scrapped!

 

“The whole Industry should welcome and support this project,” states Martin Vandenberg, Heritage Centre President. “It will help establish our status as one of the most important industries you would not want to do without: after food, healthcare, clean water for example. Automated heating raised the standards of everyone’s comfort, health, safety and convenience -- and had a major impact on our society and expanded the economy through the 20th Century.”

 

An example of this exhibit is the Centre’s first significant online feature: ‘Chilling Out: Changing Lives. Changing Society.’ on the evolution of ‘mechanical cooling’ or refrigeration and Canadian society .The HVACR Heritage Centre developed it with Canadian Heritage support in 2005. See it at www.hvacrheritagecentre.ca.     You can also support the Heritage Centre’s mission to continue recording this industry’s history and its people through your donations, membership and as a volunteer. HRAI, CIPH and COHA are supporters of this unique project.

 

Send your Emails and details of any materials you wish to share with Canadians in this online educational documentary (and for a national registry of these historic documents) to: automatedheating@gmail.com, or contact: Ron Shuker, Exec. Dir., HVACR Heritage Centre Canada, 17006 McCowan Road, Cedar Valley, ON L0G 1E0, (905) 473-2287, Cell: (416) 433-6253.

 

The legacy belongs to all of us. Making it a reality depends on you.