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Detroit Free Press from Detroit, Michigan • Page 145

Location:
Detroit, Michigan
Issue Date:
Page:
145
Extracted Article Text (OCR)

IT'S A FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH Gas Mas Varied Talents Experience has proved its superiority for some 25,000 industrial all the way from hatching chickens to making locomotives. THE REASONS for this ore many. Natural gas needs no handling or storage space. It responds instantly to thermostatic control. Its temperature and combustible atmosphere are the most easily and exactly controlled of any fuel.

Gas can be ignited quickly and easily, and immediately reaches its maximum heating capacity. Once burned, it leaves no residue. Apples can live to a ripe old age these days. It's all because of a recently developed process which preserves the just picked flavor of apples for eight months or more three to seven times longer than usual storage methods allow. The fruit's secret of youth stems from a generator which burns gas to produce a controlled atmosphere in the storage area or warehouse.

Combined with the correct humidity and temperature, this process effectively slows aging. But that's only one of the many talents of natural gas these days. Wherever heat is needed, this jack-of-all trades fuel is usually found Home. Service Solves Those Kitchen Problems -fe lL OVER THE TOP go window washers on Michigan Consolidated new building. Their railroad on the roof moves them from one position to the next on Its route around the building.

WINDOW WASHERS GO ROUND ROUND Gas Co. Goes 'Railroading running it? Who's riding it? It's working up there, that's what. Push buttons are driving it. And its passengers are people hanging from it, off the cliff of the building! IN CASE THIS sounds like mad- High up, on the edge of the 29th floor of the new Gas Company Building, along side the penthouse "crown," is a miniature railroad. It goes 'round and 'round the roof once a month, making 16 stops on each round trip.

What's it doing up there? Who's 6 Telitta You Can 'Live Modern for Loss -with When you walk into the kitchen of the Home Service Department at Michigan Consolidated Gas Company, you get a pretty quick idea of what food means to the girls who work there. It's not only good to eat but pretty enough to make a picture On one wall there is a charming "picture" which, on examination, turns out to be made of jelly beans, noodles, cookies, dog biscuits, dried lima beans, dried yellow peas, macaroni, candy-striped peppermints and gum drops. Go look at it, next time you're there. It's delightful. PEGGY LEWIS, director of the department, has an undying enthusiasm for food in any form, as long as it is tasty and attractive.

A graduate of Michigan State University, Peggy has been associated with Michigan Consolidated since 1950. She frankly admits that the two things she loves most are cooking and entertaining. And when you can say that, after an eight-hour day of doing exactly that, it must be love! The day we dropped by, five of the Home Ec girls were testing recipes. In fact, they were devoting a week to testing. There were Peggy and Ruth Stewart, from the Detroit office; Diane Cook, from Ann Arbor; Eleanor Roberts, from Grand Rapids, and Karen Claybeusch, from Mt.

Pleasant. Actually, Peggy has a staff of six in Detroit. And there are five home economists in Grand Rapids. They are all very busy people. In fact, Home Service departments in all service areas have very full schedules.

FROM JANUARY TO July, for instance, the Detroit office alone handled 10,809 phone calls from housewives asking information and made 720 home calls to show owners of new gas appliances how to use and care for them. It distributed 131,879 recipes, gave food demonstrations attended by 1,604 women, handled club programs attended by 2,400, put on food demonstrations for card parties totaling 4,418 women and took care of miscellaneous meetings with an attendance of 1,286. Along with the demonstrations at club programs and card parties, the Home Service Department also puts on school demonstrations for home economics classes and shows slide films. Its films include "Man in the Kitchen," "Cook's Tour of Europe" ness, the passengers are earning their living this way, every inch of the trip. One of the things that has caused the most conversation about the new Gas Building at Number One Woodward Ave.

are the windows. They're spectacular. They're virtually the building. In fact, there are of them and they take up 50 per cent of the face of the building. When you stand beside them, from the inside looking out, Detroit is literally at your feet.

The windows start at your toes and soar on up and they won't open. So how do they ever wash them? That's where the railroad (jomex in. FROM THE railroad-on-the-roof, window washers are lowered in a platform, two at a time, to the windows. Through bush buttons, they lower the platform, floor by floor, until one vertical "row" of windows has been washed. The railroad car then moves on to the next bay, carrying the platform with it, and the men continue washing.

After 16 bays, the car has made a trip around the building. We don't know if it's comforting as well as useful, but the men have a two-way telephone on the platform that connects them to the building's engineer's office and the building's main switchboard. The steady blue flame help shape hundreds of things you use and kee daily. There's the house in which, you live, for instance. Its window glass, asbestos, bricks, lumber, bathroom fixtures even the sink were processed by gas.

YOUR TEETH stay healthy and bright from brushing with a nylon-bristled brush which natural gas helped make. And gas had a hand in the pots and pans which cook your dinner, as wen as the plates from which you eat. Gas works with chemistry to clothe us. It was In on the creation of a woman's warm sweater, the sheer stockings she wears, the smart plastic purse she carries. And natural gas helps feed us.

Gas-fired pumps irrigate the rice fields of Louisiana and the potato fields of Idaho. This fast-acting fuel dries America's groin to prevent fermenting in storage. During cold snaps in the South, a giant gas-powered machine protects crops by warming an acre and a half all at one time! GAS GETS into the act on food processing, too. It burns hickory sawdust in smoke houses for curing and smoking meats. It speeds the ripening of bananas.

Gas-fired sterilizers disinfect hatchery equipment. And the flame that bakes cakes also helps probe outer space. The "skin" of a missile is heat treated to withstand extremely high temperatures. Nose cones are conditioned to re-enter the earth's atmosphere. Rocket components are tested for heat resistance.

Along with the rest of the country, Michigan manufacturers make the most of gas. Heat treating steel and other metals, testing automobile engines, drying ink and peeling onions are just a few of the day-to-day applications. THE' BEST proof of American industry's fondness for gas is the increase in users within the last 20 years. In 1932, some 22,000 industrial plants in the United States used gas. In 1963, the number had soared to 200,000." In fact, although only one per cent of Michigan Consolidated customers are industrial firms, they purchase more than 25 per cent of the company's volume.

These steady bulk sales to industry are what permit Michigan Consolidated and fellow utility companies to offer such low rates to home owners. Look around you. The apple you're munching, the car in your garage, the house in which you live natural gas probably helped make them what they are. Here's a Way To Cut Down Fuel Costs A new low rate for Michigan Gas Company's "ccmplete energy package," which offers remarkable savings on fuel and power costs, is now available to business and industry. Natural gas can be used as a fuel to operate any kind of engine, just like gasoline, dieeel oil or jet fuel.

The special rate applies to gas powered internal combustion engines and turbines which can be used to generate electricity, operate machinery and refrigeration compressors, pump water and other purposes. The new low rate also applies to conventional and commercial gas air conditioning, offering savings of up to 40 percent over the previous rate. MICHIGAN CONSOLIDATED is presently working on a number of projects in which natural gas will' be the only form of energy A single gas-operated engine will generate the electricity, heat the building, heat the water, air condition the building, refrigerate, dry laundry and do any other jobs requiring heat or energy. The special Gas Company rate is offered to business and industry to encourage the use of natural gas in the summer and to fill all the heating and electric power needs for industrial plants, shopping centers, apartment nouses, motels, hotels, schools, resorts and similar establishments. According to William Marion, manager of industrial and commercial sales, the single unit power package is of special benefit to those now in the process of planning or building new plants.

Did you know how much it costs the averts family, udns zs appliances, to cook three tzzziz a day for ZO days, heat all ths water nececzary for bathing, laundering and other household uec3 for SO days, dirpese of all and burrctla trarh. for SO days, dry a month's laundry It cocts lezi money than it takes to buy cz? tankful cf gz3 for the family car! When the Gas Company says, "Live modern for Iec3 with Z3" it is putting it mildly! rC3 AT OUT 3 vrcrth cf Z- PEGGY LEWIS At home in the kitchen (which takes you on a picturesque tour of seven countries besides discussing the food specialties of each), "Menu Magic" and "Hallmark of Entertaining" (a panorama of the seasons, featuring gay holiday settings, menus and unusual party food). DURING NOVEMBER and December, the department presents "Fun and Fanciful Foods" gaily wrapped for Christmas giving, for which recipes are given to each attending. During the week devoted to the test recipes, when the picture below was taken, the home economists were concentrating on family meals full time. They were testing apple-raisin turnovers and buttermilk-bran muffins and maple-glazed ham and peach cobbler and double cornbread and brown-sugared acorn squash and French toast with spiced cherry jam and shrimp Creole and blueberry pancakes and shepherd's pie and savory stuffed mushrooms and broiled grapefruit and honey-spicecake squares.

Those girls can cook! THE HOME SERVICE Auditorium, where card parties and club meetings are held, seats 150. It is on the second floor of the new Michigan Consolidated Building at One Woodward Ave. Detroit. In the lobby outside, with its magnificent view of the river, are model kitchens that out-modern the most modern ideas you could dream of for a kitchen. Plus a utility room with a furnace discreetly hidden behind a louvered closet door! If you haven't visited these kitchens or the Home Service Department, by all means do so.

WHEN IT COMES TO 'FRESHNESS' Mother Nature Takes Back Seat to a Dryer Svo: A you c3 Tiy ona cf Co inj: Cool; rlraost three tzZzj I dcs. You can grill ezozh burgers to feed a fccci ones a day cr ahnoct 2y2 yz Cake a cociis fcr zzzn, v-ziza and ctZl Li Arbcr. I'zZry czzovzt ccIT. to r. man ari his wife fcr 7 every mcncj from their x.

2 day until well past thir 12Lh weddis anniversary. Fry cnoujh e3 to chickens tury layfcij era r. for a full yc it. "7 cleaning. They air-fluff the dust out in their dryer.

They let the dryer raise the nap on velvets and velveteens. They dry out the children's wet snowsuits in their dryer. And bathing suits in summertime. They renew the life of pillows in their dryer. If their newspaper is rain soaked, their dryer dries it.

And they use their dryer to get lint off their husband's suits. GAS DRYERS are the most efficient and economical. A gas dryer costs about two cents an hour to operate, whereas other types cost several times as much. This is one reason why 97 per cent of the self-service laundries use gas dryers exclusively. The Gas Company points out, also, that a gas dryer operates by a flame and a flame won't wear out.

You can get years and years of trouble-free service from a flame-operated dryer. There is no "warm-up" wait on a gas dryer, either, no risk of "baking" clothes. They last longer. Modern gas dryers provide features like damp-drying to eliminate dampening before ironing, lint traps, safety doors, interior lights, stationary or tumble positions, pushbutton settings, quick operation and a choice of speeds and heats for every different type of fabric. In one day, these men wash two bays, or 600 windows.

They taka eight days to complete the building. They also wash the concrete and quartz walls of the building with steam once a year. But if the windows are conver sation pieces, consider -these facts It took 5,700 tons of steel, 25,000 yards of concrete and 1,800 tons of quartz to make this 32-story build ing. Twelve high speed elevators, operated by an electronic brain, make enough trips to carry an average of 10,000 persons daily They travel 72,000 miles a year, up and down. THERE IS a bridged, reflecting pool in front of the building and at the top is Detroit's first sky scraper restaurant and cocktail lounge, "The Top of the Flame." It is also the largest and most modern gas air conditioned office building in the world.

When you're in it, if you feel like you're walking on air, you are. A novel feature lets the conditioned air flow directly beneath each floor to vents in the outer walls through which it enters the offices. And if that's not different, the air conditioning plant is in the penthouse not the basement 1 The master minds behind the building include some famous names. Minora Yamasaki conceived the design. Smith, Hinchman and Gillis did the architectural engineering.

W. B. Ford Design Associates were consultants on interior design, dec oration and furnishings. Bryant and Detwiler was the general con tractor. Many women think it's good to air their wash in the sun to dry it.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Air can be a windy gale that whiplashes fabrics. It can also carry dust, soot, grime. And sun fades colors. An amazing fact about clothesline drying is that it's hard on clothes.

Even inside clotheslines can be hard on wash. The wash just hangs there on its own damp weight. It's not easy, for instance, to shake a shag rug really fluffy after it has hardened dry on the line. And most women won't trust a hand-knit dress to the line. AND EFFORT! Housewives lift 45 pounds of damp wash to the line every washday.

That's the average. If you wash twice a week, that's nearly 2Vfc tons a year! Modern gas dryers actually give clothes more "freshness" than outdoor drying. Most automatic dryers have an ultraviolet lamp that makes wash really sunshine fresh with no dust or soot to smear it. These dryers are the nicest things that ever happened to a baby's diapers delivering 20 to 24 of them dry and warm in less than half an hour. Apparently, automatic dryers have a lot of uses you won't find in advertisements.

Women use them to get dust off heavy draperies that don't need GAS COMPANY HOME SERVICE GIRLS make homemaker's task a lot easier by devising better and quicker ways to do things. Testing recipes In Michigan Consolidated's kitchens are Eleanor Roberts of Grand Rapids, Diane Cook of Ann Arbor, Ruth Stewart of Detroit and Karen Claybeusch of Mt Pleasant..

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Pages Available:
3,650,304
Years Available:
1837-2024