Measures for Progress: A History of the National Bureau of Standards

264 THE TIDE OF. COMMERCE AND INDUSTRY (1920-30)
pared a circular for householders on "How to get better service with less
natural gas in domestic gas appliances." 123
With the rising cost of gas, a rash of inventions appeared, so-called
gas-saving devices, to be used on the top burners of gas ranges. Tests
showed their claims of economy to be worthless and, where manufactured
gas was used, proved that some of these devices created hazards even greater
than those in the appliances themselves.124 But the real problem was the
poor design of most of the gas appliances then on the market.123
The appliance makers were naturally reluctant to change their prod-
ucts and charged that the Bureau was prejudiced and favored the electrical
industry. Bureau suggestions of better design for greater thermal efficiency
and safety in gas cooking stoves, water heaters, and room heaters, therefore,
met with little acceptance by the industry. Then, in the winter of 1922—23
an unusually large number of deaths occurred in many parts of the country
from gas poisoning.
Upon Bureau inquiry of the health departments it was learned that
New York had had 750 carbon monoxide deaths during the previous year,
Chicago 500, Baltimore 42, Cincinnati 13, and Los Angeles 24. Because the
in(lustry tended to attribute all reported fatalities by gas to suicide, the last
two cities were• of particular interest since they were supplied with natural
gas, which does not contain carbon monoxide, and therefore cannot be used
successfully for suicide.
The investigation made by Bureau engineers with the cooperation
of Baltimore's Consolidated Gas & Electric Co. and city public health offi-
cials confirmed the previous findings of badly designed or badly adjusted
gas appliances. When the results were published, the president of the
American Gas Association came to the Bureau and demanded that further
publication be withheld. More foLward-Iooking members of the industry
realized the value of the research and persuaded the association to support
a research associate group at the Bureau to assist in the work. Little more
than a year later the association set up its own laboratories, hired away a
Bureau gas engineer as supervisor, and shortly after established a seal of
approval and inspection system that quickly brought the appliance industry
into line. Two years later, deaths in Baltimore traceable to faulty gas
"C116 (1921). Antiquated plant equipment and inefliciency also contributed to the
waste, Stratton told Congress, and these were compensated for by the industry through
periodic increases in the rates. Hearings * * * 1921 (Jan. 2, 1920), pp. 1560—1561.
NBS Annual Report 1922, p. 71. LC397 (1933) and C404, "Cautions regarding
gas-appliance attachments" (Eiseman, 1934), summed up more than a decade of in-
vestigation of these "gas-savers."
See T193 (1920) and C394 (1931) on the design of gas burners for domestic use.