On this episode of Our American Stories, before air conditioning, summer shaped how people worked, where they lived, and which cities could survive the heat. That all began to change in 1902, when Willis Carrier designed a machine to solve humidity problems in a printing plant. His invention cooled the air around us and quietly reshaped modern life. From factories and theaters to homes and highways, air conditioning took hold—one building at a time. Jesse Edwards, a frequent Our American Stories contributor, explores how this once-overlooked breakthrough became one of the most influential innovations in American history.
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Bass Reeves: The Former Slave Who Tamed the Wild West
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What Lee Iacocca and Henry Ford II Taught a 23-Year-Old Newbie
10:49

Thomas Mundy Peterson: The First Black Voter Under the 15th Amendment
09:29