🚀 go-pugleaf

The most interesting heater advertisement from the early 20th century came from the Novelty Manufacturing Company of Jackson, Michigan. Their advertisement offered something much better than the old coal standby. Novelty advertised its “X-Radium” heater as the best and latest heating technology. An advertisement boasted that “one of its chief advantages is the fact that it requires no fuel. . . . the heating pad consists of a stamped steel receptacle filled with a substance which will attract itself heat rays and retain the heat attracted for several hours. The substance they used was radium.  Radium was an intriguing new material to manufacturers, who found a spot for it in a number of products, even toothpaste! In the first years of the 20th century the deadly power of radium was not yet understood and the idea of resting one’s feet on a container of radioactive material did not sound as terrifying as it does to today’s consumers.


z Muzeum Poczty


https://postalmuseum.si.edu/collections/object-spotlight/rfd-carriage-heater