Willis Haviland Carrier may get credit as the first to devise a system for simultaneously cooling, dehumidifying, circulating and cleansing the air. But it’s a Tar Heel, Stuart W. Cramer, who coined the term to describe the system. Cramer delivered a talk on “Recent Development in Air Conditioning” at the annual conference of the American Cotton Manufacturers Association in May 1906.
We’ve got more on Cramer and air conditioning in our latest This Month in History. Check it out.
I heartily agree that Cramer is a significant figure in the southern textile industry. Does anyone know of any family papers? There is a collection of letters written to him at Harvard while he was a salesman for Whitin Machine Works, but little else.
And I wouldn’t get too excited about his air conditioning work. He developed that equipment not for the comfort of the worker but to eliminate static electricity in the combed yarn mills around Gastonia, North Carolina. Cotton dust takes a great deal of humidity out of the air and makes it difficult to spin yarn in such a dry atmosphere.
His grandfather was a Thomas, for whom Thomasville was named. So he came from a distinguished southern family.
From 1900 to the First World War he was one of the principals investing in and managing the infamous Loray Mill, but he could never make it turn a profit.
Also very involved with the national Republican Party.
Cramerton is near Charlotte and is now a suburban real estate development.
Cramerton is much more than a suburban real estate development. While it is true that Cramer’s mountain estate has been developed as a neighborhood of: Cramerton it is a stretch to consider it suburban. We have small town atmosphere and many of the mill houses built by Cramer are being refurbished. Our town motto “Pride in our past, Faith in our future” reflects a commitment to remember what Cramerton was, what it is,and what it can become.