Science: Ice Man

In 1864 the U. S. Congress passed an act providing a gallery in the Capitol to house "statues of two distinguished citizens from each state who were illustrious for their historic renown." Since then 35 states have made contributions to Statuary Hall. A few of the figures are known to every schoolboy (Washington and Lee from Virginia; Daniel Webster from New Hampshire; Andrew Jackson from Tennessee; Samuel Adams and John Winthrop from Massachusetts; John C. Calhoun from South Carolina; Sam Houston from Texas). Most of them, though, are second-rate politicians of the last century whose fame has already faded out of history. A few are local heroes so obscure and forgotten as to cause derisive mirth among Capitol sightseers. Such a one is the statue of Dr. John Gorrie, sent to Washington by Florida in 1914. Dr. Gorrie is identified as the first successful maker of artificial ice in the U. S. Not long after Dr. Gorrie died in 1855 famed Botanist-Physician Alvan Wentworth Chapman and Harvard's even more celebrated Botanist Asa Gray passed Gorrie's grave during a stroll. Said Chapman: "Gray, there is the grave of the man whom we all recognize as the superior of all of us."

No book-length biography of Gorrie has ever been written. His story was told last week in Scientific Monthly by Professor George Byron Roth of George Washington University. Born in Charleston, S. C. in 1803, John Gorrie studied medicine in the North — exactly where, no one knows. He began practice in the seaport of Apalachicola, Fla., took such an interest in municipal affairs that he became postmaster, city treasurer, city councillor, mayor. Fever descended on Apalachicola every summer and Dr. Gorrie found it impossible to treat his patients in the hot weather. The earnest young physician thought the best thing was to cool his patients off, and for that he needed ice. Compressed air escaping from a small orifice feels cold.

Dr. Gorrie was a good enough physicist to know that expanding air absorbs heat from its surroundings. Accordingly he built a steam-driven pump which packed air to ten times atmospheric pressure. The released air chilled water until it froze. Dr. Gorrie was granted U. S. Patent No. 8,080.

For ai-conditioning, Dr. Gorrie placed the ice in "an ornamental mantel vase, urn or basin" suspended close to the ceiling by chains. Immediately above the ice a hole was made in the ceiling. Into this was fitted a pipe which led through the floor above to the chimney. Air contracting around the cold ice created a partial vacuum which sucked outside air from the chimney. This blew over the ice, spilled down around the room, cooled the patient's fever.

The doctor-inventor became so engrossed in his air-conditioning that he gave up medical practice to push his ice machines. An agent appointed in Manhattan accomplished little or nothing. Almost penniless, Dr. Gorrie went to New Orleans for backing, found a Boston man who bought half the project. The Bostonian died. Unable to interest anyone else, Dr. Gorrie went back to Apalachicola, secluded himself, brooded, sickened, died at 52.