What did you have for heat growing up?

[Swampfox]

House I grew up in was over 100 years old, had one of those in floor gas radiators with the metal grill over it, no a/c, back half of the house had sank about a foot over the years, this was in West Virginia, as soon as I was old enough to leave I got out of that crap hole of a state and moved to SC, I advanced 50 years when I crossed the state line, dont miss that place one bit.

Once my parents sold the house the new owner tore it down to build a new house, the whole house collapsed as they were tearing down the first wall.

[vmc1161]

Originally posted by mattm
I found out that those hot metal things that I melted crayons on in the winter were the steam heat registers.

In the country we used a wood burner in the middle of the house. That's where the beans and tators and **** got cooked in the winter months.

Something tells me you ate the crayons to!

In New England we dont cook our ****, I think you guys call that grits dont you?

[aircooled53]

Dearborn gas floor type ,with high output ceramic tiles.These were used in living room and bedrooms with old trusty in the bathroom built into the wall,white or aqua were the best colors.

When I was about 10 we had our first floor furnace and still used dearborns in bedrooms. Junior High we lived with swamp coolers that used to knock the **** out of me when I had to change the pads out, them old 110 pumps would really wake you up if the ground was wet and you grabbed a panel.
No a/c until high school and then we didn't turn it on until it was 90*.

[BaldLoonie]

We had a neat old 1910s place with converted gravity hot water. 50s vintage National US Radiator gas boiler with a pump. NICE HEAT!!!

[Green Mountain]

We lived in the city of Albany. Our family rented the top floor of a 2 family house. The kitchen stove was combination gas for cooking and kerosene for heating. The living room had a kerosene parlor stove. The kerosene was stored in a 55 gal drum in the basement. Each stove had a portable tank that my father would fill and carry upstairs.

Right after the Christmas tree came down. The living room got shut off with blankets over the door and the heating bill got cut in half. The parlor stove was shut off. They should have put my mother in charge of the Department of Energy.

[west_seth]

1- Coal w/pot belly stove but I barely remember it. Used to find pieces of coal and the spent ones in the yard when I played outside.
2- LP gas with just a few small heaters that was turned 100% off at night and restarted in the morning. (no pilor lights on these boys)
3- Natural gas with one big heater. Turned off at night and cut on in the morning. If it got really really cold they would leave it on very very low.

I do remember my Grandpa's General store with a big old pot belly stove and the old men huddling around it. I used to love to spit on it to hear the sizzzzzzzzzzle. And of course many of the farmers we knew had fireplaces only.

Gosh I am old. Anybody got a pot bellied stove for me to huddle around this winter?

[hal parker]

I used teen age girls. Worked great for a while but the maintenance was too much.

[snipe70e]

The ranch house was over 150 years old. No frame just clap boards. We had an oil stove in the living room, that was all. At night it got turnned off. If it was cold outside it was just as cold inside.
In the morning we would grab our close and head down stairs. Turn on the oil, get a match light it and a little piece of paper and toss it into the stove. Then sit on the stove until it got worm. then stand next to it until it got hot, then we would get dressed. This was 4 to 5 in the morning.
In high school we got a Ashley wood stove. Mom would put a large log in that thing and close all the dampers before going to bed. By morning that wood would be one large red coal. It kept the house worm all night and in the morning all you had to do was open the dampers put in a new log and the house was tostie. It was great.

[secorp]

Each child was givin a match stick furnace to go to bed with, It was a one BTU furnace. we had to walk "bar"foot in the snow up a icy hill to use the Out House, but that's a story for another thread.

[vmc1161]

Originally posted by hal parker
I used teen age girls. Worked great for a while but the maintenance was too much.

Are you saying you have switched to teenage boys?

[vmc1161]

Originally posted by secorp
Each child was givin a match stick furnace to go to bed with, It was a one BTU furnace. we had to walk "bar"foot in the snow up a icy hill to use the Out House, but that's a story for another thread.

But doesn't poop flow downhill?

[Workhorse]

When I lived in Upstate NY we had radiator heat that of course never worked and a fireplace that always nearly caught the house on fire. With that being the case we got warm the old fashioned way, me and my 2 brothers all in the same bed with several blankets. Of course me being the youngest and smallest I always got short blanketed. Thank God when I came to Florida I have not had the need for heat. An extra shirt or light jacket once in a great while but never any heat.

[icemeister]

Oil-fired one pipe steam system in New Hampsire.

Bang.....hiss.......bang.......hiss........all night long.