The Comforts of Home

the long version

"In The Comforts of Home, an unprecedented work written for a general audience with no particular knowledge of science or technology, social historian Merritt Ierley weaves in aspects of architecture, social history, and technology to present an underexplored but central feature of American cultural identity: how our lives are shaped by the domestic technology around us. Here we see a simple brick cubicle with a stove inside it evolve into central heating, a barrel with a large handle become the automatic washing machine, a box lined with charcoal give us the modern refrigerator, and the modern toilet develop from a rudimentary stone trough."--BOOK JACKET.