THE MARVIL HOUSE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3061, 13 November 1912, Page 89

THE MARVIL HOUSE.

TRIUMPH OF ELECTRICITY.

The other day it was announced that there would shortly be opened in West Orange, New Jersey, a man-el home completely equipped with all the latest electrical devices now practicable even in the most remote districts. The Wizard Edison, who harnessed electricity for city-dwellers, has at last made electrical homes possible for agriculturists and suburbanites. After seven years, during which time he conducted 55.000 experiments and expended over £400,000, Thomas A. Edison nas perfected a type of isolated lighting plant with the aid of his storage batteries which will transform any home into a modern electrical house (saye_ the New York World). The marvel house on Honeysuckle avenue, Llewellyn Park, West Orange, is the first suburban house to be completely equipped with all the electrical devices. A small four-horse power gasoline engine which has to be run only a few hours every third day drives a dynamo which charges the storage batteries. The batteries furnish electricity that is available at all hours for lighting, heating, cooking, and cleaning, as well as for all the other electrical appliances in the house. There arc no switchboards, no complicated devices of any kind. The old-fashioned lead sulphuric acid batteries with their offensive fumes are replaced by batteries that require no attention except a little water from time to time. No knowledge of electricity is needed to operate the plant, which means that the day of the dimly-lighted farmhouse with its ill-smell-ing oil lamps will soon be a thing of the past. No More Drudgery.— Besides being brilliantly illuminated from cellar to garret by its storage hattries, the marvel house has eliminated drudgery to the last degree. The kitchen is equipped with an electric range, electric dishwashers, clothes-washers, grills, and flatirons. There is an electric icebox which manufactures., its own ice. In the dining room there is an electric coffee

percolator, an electric toaster, chafing dish, eggboiler, and, of course, electric bells. In the drawing room is a new Edison phonograph, which has eliminated all metallic tones and the scratching of needles by the substitution of a diamond point and unbreakable disc records made of condensate. In the front hall there is an electrical clock which winds itself automatically. _ .... Upstairs in the billiard room, which is built over the porte cochere, there is a home kinetoscope, one of Edison s most recent inventions. As its name implies, it is a small moving-picture machine, and with it motion views are easily _ obtainable in any home. Its quarter-inch films project pictures 4ft by sft, which are thrown on a screen suspended on the opposite wall. Seventy-five feet of this miniature film is equivalent to 2000 ft of the regular size. The little films will be handled in the same way as the regulation size, which means that the owner of a home kinetoscope will have hundreds of thousands of films at his disposal.

Comfort in the Bedrooms. —

The bedrooms of this marvel house are, of course, equipped with the most modern appliances. In addition to reading lamps at the bedside, there are electric heating pads for warming the bed, electric foot-warmers, devices for heating curling irons •by electricity, electric fans for keeping cool in hot weather. In the bathrooms there are electric heaters for warming the towels, for heating shaving water, and for electric massage. There is also a device for sterilising toothbrushes. In the dcu or library on the second floor there is an Edison business phonograph into which letters can be dictated. The rooms are all connected by telephone, and thermostats control the temperature. If the temperature rises above a certain degree in any room the heat is automatically shut off. Electric vacuum-cleaners put an end to sweeping and dusting. The storage batteries supply the cun-cut for all these devices. No longer are they the monopoly of the city-dweller, who buys current from a central plant. These isolated lighting plants manufacture current as cheaply as it can be bought, even in the most accessible locations. A small gasoline engine, the number of horsepower depending on the size of the house, with the aid of a dynamo and these wonderful storage batteries, is all that is necessary for an electrical house in the most sparsely-settled country districts. Not only can a farmer or suburbanite reduce household drudgery to a minimum, hut with moving pictures and phonograph records to entertain him and a bril-liantly-lighted home, he has no occasion to miss the “bright lights” of the city.