Gold Medal Glenwood Gas/Wood Combination Range

A wonderful new range, so named to commemorate the bestowal upon all Glenwoods of the Gold Medal Award at both the San Francisco and San Diego Expositions - 1915.

Weir Stove Company,
Taunton, MA

Makers of the Celebrated Glenwood Ranges for Coal, Wood or Gas, Heating Stoves and Furnaces.

The Gold Medal Glenwood is a new, distinct type of combination range, in fact, two complete modern ranges using different fuels, skillfully built into one compact stove for greater convenience.

There is absolutely no danger in this combination, as the gas section is as entirely seperate from the coal section as if placed in another part of the kitchen.

Although it is less than four feet long, it can do every kind of cooking for any ordinary family by gas in warm weather, by coal or wood when the kitchen needs heating and by a combination of the two in emergencies.

The coal section burns either hard or soft coal, coke or wood, and the gas section either manufactured or natural gas.

Cast Iron is used wholly in the construction of the coal section, as this the most durablt material known for a coal rage.

The Gas Section oves are made of White Aluminized Sheets. This metal is highly desirable for a gas range as it heats quickly, is rust resisting and keeps the kitchen cook in summer.

The Gas Broler Oven, above at the right, is the same length as the gas baking oven - eighteen inches wide, sixteen inches deep and twelve inches high. It is fitted with a cast iron shelf adjustable to any height, and a jointless sanitary drip pan containing a neat, wire rack.

The Broiler Burner is rectangular in shape with six arms each with two lines of flame. It has one hundred and fifty squares inches of direct heating surface and is removable.

The Gas Baking and Broiling Ovens are lined with white rust-resisting aluminized sheet, that do not chip off, but keep smooth and last with the rest of the rage.

The Heat is under complete control and can be regulated by means or burner cocks at the side.

The Back above the cooking top is protected by white enameled splashers, easily kept spotless, and the gas broiler door is panneled with the same material.

The Capacity of a range is an important consideration when buying. Many combination ranges have one rather small baking oven. A feature of the Gold Medal Glenwood is two very room baking ovens as shown in these pictures.

Pastry Baking is being done in the gas oven, where it is progress is always in sight. The most delicate cake can be perfectly baked and watched through glass paneled door.

The Heat in the gas oven is so uniform that two shelves are provided, and two batches of bread or pastry can be baked at one time.

A Large Roast and other baking can be done at the same time in the coal oven. Thhe advantage is plain - two ovens give double capacity, and allow the cook to complete the baking in one-half the usual time.

Just see the cooking surface at hand if want to rush things.

By using both the coal and the gas sections of the top, nine large cookin guntensils may be quickly heated at the same time, or the coal section may be used for boiling and the gas section with burners turned low may be used for simmering or keeping warm the dishes already cooked.

A Push Button Lighter for lighting all cooking burners is can be furnished at slight additional cost.

The Oven Burners are the one-piece type, easily removed for cleaning and cannot be put back wrong. The end of each burner is machine faced ad carefully fitted with a steel air shutter, which can be accurately adjusted to give the proper combustion.

The Tight Joints and tight-fitting doors of the gas section are an important feature, as less gas is needed than in ordinary ranges.

The Glenwood oscillating shelf under the coal oven door is a great convenience when basting meats or removing food as it is ingeniously arranged to move up exactly level with the bottom of the oven when the door is opened. The Swing Oven Door is acknowledged the most satisfactory in preserving heat and in baking.

The Glenwood Swing Door is always tight when closed, no springs to get out of order, and allow door to become loose and waste heat.

The Lower Oven is roomy and can be heated by either wood or coal. It is fitted with an adjustable shelf, and will bake evenly its full capacity at one time.

The Nickel Edge Band is not bolted but held by a patent spring latch which one finger will unsnap when it is to be taken off. This feature will be appreciated when it is necessary to clean the range.

All Gas Cocks have adjustable orafices, allowing just the right amount of gas ro be supplied to burners for perfect combustion.

The Glenwood Pedal Oven Door Opener unlatches and opens the door by a slight pressure of the foot with both hands are occupied.

The Grate can be drawn out from beneath the firbox linings without their being disturbed. so that a new grate can be replaced and still keep in use the odl linings.

The Sectional Top over the Coal Section prevents warping and is so planned that by changing the cross-shaped castings that hold the covers a wash boiler may be placed at the back of the range, leaving the fron two holes free for cooking.

At a glance the Glenwood Patent Indicator on the oven door tells the degree of heat required for boiling, baking pies, plain or sponge cake, bread and biscuits and the indicator point registers the degree of heat already in the oven. It is so plain and simple you just can’t make a mistake.

Any one of the three different Coal Grates may be used in this range according to the choice of the purchaser. Firebox linings made of fire clay are recommended for burning hard coal; and east iron linings for soft coal. When burning wood only, the Glenwood Wood Grate, with cast iron side linings to match, increases the fuel space and is most efficient.

The Fuel Recommended is a good grade of hard coal, in either nut or stove size. The better grades of soft coal, however, may be used with good results.

This Range is Most Attractie looking and its appearance of efficiency is fully sustained by its performance.

Coal Range Flues ahould not be allowed to fill with ashed and soot, as no ranges can do good work if the flue spaces are obstructed.

Doors of easy access have been provided in the Gold Medal Glenwood Range for properly cleaning all flues. See plate A and B in diagram below.

Instructions for Cleaning Flue Spaces

• To Clean the Top Oven Flue
  Remove the four lids in coal range top and scrape all ashes on oven top directly into fire box as indicated by arrow number one.
• To Clean Oven Side Flue
  Remove Plate A located beneath pan under gas cooking burners and scrape all ashes to bottom as indicated by arrow number two.
• To Clean Oven Bottom Flues
  Remove Plate B under shelf below oven door and scrape all ashed out through opening B into a pan placed on kitchen floor. Arrows number three and four indicate direction to scrape. Be careful to replace plates A and B securely.

A Glenwood in pearl gray porcelain enamel adds a new charm to cooking. No more soiled hands, no more dust and smut.

Picture and Comfort of being able to clean you range perfectly in less than two minutes.

Polishing the stove, once one of the most hated task in household work is now the easiet, - simply wipe a Glenwood with a damp cloth and in no time you have a sparkling clean surface.

Resolve never to polish the old stove until you see the Glenwood dealer about a new pearl grey porcelain enameled Gold Medal Glenwood - the range that “Makes Cooking Easy”.

Get to Know the Antique Parlor Stove Better!

Facets & Features of the Parlor Stove Loading, Cleaning and Controlling the Parlor Stove
	LOADING The parlor stove is a great of heating stoves and can warm anywhere from 2-6 rooms. It has a large loading area on the side where a built-in smoke shelf prevents smoke from rolling out as the stove is loaded. The stove can comfortably hold a 16-24″ stick of wood. The wood is placed on top of a grate inside of the stove. The fire can burn an average of 8-12 hours. The length of stick and burn time, and the amount of rooms warmed, will depend on the size of the cylinder stove.
	DRAFT CONTROLS Parlor stoves have both primary draft controls located in the front of the stove below the front door. When starting the fire, open up the primary controls. This allows for the air to come in directly under the grate causing the fire to ignite and burn from the bottom up. Once the fire is well established, adjust the primary controls as needed to regulate the fire.
	CLEAN OUT Cleaning out the stove is very convenient with a cylinder stove. Every parlor stoves come with a handy ash pan that sits directly under the grates inside the stove. To clean out the ashes simply remove the ash pan and dump the ashes in a safe location. Please use caution when discarding the ashes so to prevent starting a fire in any other location other than inside your cylinder stove. The ash pan allows you to clean out your stove even when the fire is still burning. And the good news for folks who don’t like to dust, the ash pan keeps the fly ash to a minimum.
	COOK LID All parlor stoves have at least one cook lid located beneath the dome at the top of the stove. Most of the lids are about 8 inches in diameter. The cook lid is ideal for holding a pot of water that acts as a humidifier. And it is a wonderful location to warm a pot of tea. So while the tea’s steeping, lets pull up a chair and enjoy the cuddly warmth from the stove with a cup of wild berry zinger herbal tea.

Franklin Fireplace Stove - An Ingenious Invention

Ben Franklin’s Ingenious Stove

Circa 1744 No More Coughs or Fevers

Among the educated and enlightened men of 18th-century America, none was more influential or gifted than Benjamin Franklin. He had few peers who could match his intellect and versatility as author, scientist, inventor, printer, philosopher, and popular moralizer. Being essentially a provincial American, Franklin’s mind turned on practical matters, including the problem of how to heat a room evenly and inexpensively. From these musings came his remarkable Franklin Stoves, the first of which were manufactured in 1744 by Franklin’s friend Robert Grace.They were originally called “Pennsylvania Fire-Places,” and Franklin himself wrote the first advertisement to publicize the stove, in which he claimed, “If you sit near the Fire, you have not that cold Draught of uncomfortable Air nipping your Back and Heels, as when before common Fires…being scorcht before, and, as it were, froze behind.” Franklin’s stove was essentially a free-standing iron fireplace. It contained an air box below the hearth into which fresh, cold air was drawn by the heat of the fire over the box. Behind the fire stood an air column - actually an extension of the air box - the whole unit being L-shaped. At the top of the air column, the fresh air, now warmed by the fire, was allowed to escape back into the room; but the smoke was forced over, around, down, then up and out through the chimney. In short, the fire heated a separate volume of air from that which was mixed with smoke from the fire - an ingenious recycling system that constantly forced warm air down from above and back into the room where it was needed. According to Franklin, this method was healthier than warm air produced by common fireplaces “by which many catch cold, whence proceed Coughs, Catarrhs, Toothache, Fevers, Pleurisies, and many other Diseases.” Franklin also claimed his product was more efficient than other stoves and fireplaces because it burned less wood, a great advantage indeed for those who lived where wood was in short supply. Since Franklin lived in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, not far from one of the world’s great coal regions, one can only be amused by his statement in 1744 that, by the use of his Pennsylvania Fire-Place, ” . . . our Wood may grow as fast as we consume it, and our Posterity may warm themselves at a moderate Rate, without being oblig’d to fetch their Fuel over the Atlantick…”

Building and Managing a Fire in a Wood-Burning Kitchen Stove

THE SECRET OF BETTER BAKING

By Mary D. Chambers, B.S., A.M.
Portland Stove Foundry
Associate Editor of American Cookery
Author of Principles of Food Preparation, One-Piece Dinners, Etc., Etc., Etc.
PORTLAND STOVE FOUNDRY CO.
PORTLAND, MAINE
Original 1925 Edition

In one of the comedies of a generation ago there is a love scene in which the hero picks up a leathery looking object and makes a show of trying to bend it over his knee.

“What is it?” he asks.

The maid hangs her head in embarrassment, but replies courageously, “It’s a pie, I made it.”

“I’ll eat it!” exclaims the delighted lover.

But the lady, with an eye to the future, recovers the pie and persuades the youth to prove his valor in less hazardous ways.

Baking a crisp, juicy pie or a deftly browned loaf of bread or managing a Thanksgiving dinner is a worthwhile accomplishment. The kitchen range is close to the center of the home. It not only provides the main sustenance of life, but needed warmth for winter’s cold and plentiful hot water to encourage the highly regarded virtue of cleanliness.

Victorian Home Magazine.
June 2006. p 59.

Hundreds of cookbooks and collections of recipes of famous chefs witness the desire for variety in palatable and wholesome dishes. The implements of cooking have made equally rapid strides until they approach close to perfection. But a recipe book and the finest equipped kitchen in the world do not make a cook. A good cook has learned how to handle her range so that it does her bidding without effort or “off days.” And the cookbooks do not tell her. There seems to be very little help for those who are making their first acquaintance with a modern range. This booklet is an introduction to your stove-just a few hints to make the acquaintance ripen more rapidly and help you to a fuller enjoyment of the hours spent in the kitchen.

Good Time Stove Company Archive. © 2006.

BUILDING THE FIRE

A good modern range is designed to get the greatest cooking and heating value out of the flue used. When the range and chimney draft are right, a properly controlled fire wiIl do all the work required, without wasting fuel.

It is therefore necessary to bear in mind that the first problem of better baking is an understanding of the fire. If a match is lighted, the flame shoots upward. The hot blaze causes a DRAFT, drawing fresh air from below and supplying the oxygen necessary for combustion. The range simply makes use of this basic principle on a large scale.

To start the fire, then, have on hand plenty of free-burning fuel-dry paper and woodcut small. A folded newspaper will not burn freely, but a few sheets lightly twisted make a good first layer. Then a moderate supply of kindling wood, lay in loosely.

Before lighting, open the door or slide under the fire, also the direct draft to the chimney (over the oven) and the check slide at the base of smoke pipe and also the damper in the smoke pipe. The purpose is to promote a free passage of air up through the firebox to the chimney by the most direct route.

Remember that no stove has a draft of itself. The draft is furnished by the chimney through the stovepipe, which obviously must be tight in all its joints. Light the fire from below and allow it to get a good start. If it burns too slowly, it needs more oxygen, supplied by opening the door wide under the fire. If it burns too fast, it wiII produce more smoke than the chimney can draw off and the excess wiII be thrown out into the room. Partly closing the door under the fire will retard it. (The first fire in a new range usually causes a little surface smoke and oily odor. This is harmless and soon passes off).

Before applying coal, add a little more kindling. The grate should be well covered with a brisk fire, both to support and ignite the coal evenly and to prevent waste through the grate.

Never use kerosene to quicken a slow fire.

When the coal fire has a good start the oven damper may be closed.

The process of keeping up a good coal fire is merely one of adding more fuel, and occasionally “shaking down” to remove the ashes under the coal.

Do not allow ashes to collect close up under the grate. In fact, this is about the only way a grate is damaged in ordinary use.

Some housekeepers, who depend upon the kitchen heating adjoining rooms or for continuous hot water, maintain the same coal fire for months at a time.

When not in use for cooking, the oven door may to help heat the adjoining rooms.

CHECKING THE FIRE.

If the draft of air through the firebox continues unchecked, the fuel soon burns out, and the top of the range gets red hot-a bad thing for the stove.

This may be accomplished in various ways-by closing tight the door and slide under the fire-by partially closing the damper in the stovepipe or pushing in the slide near the stove pipe collar on top of the range-by opening the slide in the broiler door at the end of the range over the fire- or by tipping the lids or covers over the fire. The chimney keeps pulling for air and reducing the amount of chimney allowing the air to rush in over the fire, instead of through it checks the fire.

Closing the damper over the oven also checks the degree, but the real purpose of this damper is to send the heat around the oven on its way to the chimney.

ADVANTAGE OF A LARGE FIREBOX

The range should have a firebox large enough to keep a coal fire over night. Under proper damper control it will smolder all night and have sufficient life to rekindle quickly in the morning. Then, too, it requires far more fuel to start new fore frequently keep and old fire. If it is found that the fire does not keep over night, the trouble is due to one of two things. Either the draft is too strong, causing the fire to burn out, or too weak, causing the fire to die for lack of air.

No directions can be given in advance to cover every case, because chimney drafts vary so much, but there is some happy medium that can be determined by a little experiment. Generally speaking, the slide in the broiler door should be open at night and the slide under the smoke collar should be pushed to the left to some extent.

In any case, it is essential in the morning to get rid of quite a large body of ashes that has accumulated in the firebox. At least one-half and perhaps two-thirds of the contents of the fire box usually consists of ashes and coals which give no heat, and must be removed every morning to re-establish a good fire for baking. A half revolution of the dock ash grate wiII usually do this very nicely, and in fact this grate is designed for this particular purpose. If a stove is equipped with a plain grate, considerable shaking is necessary. The triangular grate may be handled similarly to the dock ash grate, turning one-third or two-thirds or even sometimes a full revolution.

The ashes should be removed from the ash pit or pan, both to improve the draft and to prevent injury to the grate.

It would be difficult to over-emphasize the trouble that can be avoided by a regular and systematic cleaning out of ashes and dying embers under the coal. A fire may look bright on top and yet be almost out. Its body of clinkers and ashes has little heating value and unless there are enough live coals on top to rekindle easily, it is better judgment to dump the fire and start new.

Naturally a deep coal fire will do more work than a shallow fire. Once well built up, a deep fire can be maintained more easily and with less fuel than a fire that half fills the firebox. However, the box should not be filled above the top of the bricks, as there is danger of overheating and warping the lids.

Learn All About Antique Pot Belly Stoves

POTBELLY STOVES Antique and Vintage Potbelly Stoves
	Hmmm. Can’t you just smell the aroma as the coffee pot simmers on the cook-lid on top of the antique potbelly stove? I’m ready to pull up a chair and pour myself a cup. It’s time to rest for a spell and reminisce. Would you like to join me as I travel back in time to visit one of the most beloved and recognizable heirlooms in the country - the vintage potbelly stove?
TABLE OF CONTENTS
	This article contains the following sections: 1. Good Time Stove Co. Potbelly Inventory 2. Potbelly points 3. Potbelly Stoves in Setting General Stores School Houses Trains and Stations Frontier Establishments American Art Hollywood Movies 4. Happy Customers 5. Old Stove Catalogs 6. Vintage Trade Cards 7. Factory information 8. Founder information 9. General Stores
POTBELLY POINTS
The Skinny On The Portly All of our potbelly stoves are antique, vintage, functional pieces of art.
Antique potbelly stoves are made entirely from solid cast iron. Their shape of a potbelly stove resembles the midriff of an aging fellow, gaining the stove, which was once referred to as a Cannon Stove, the affectionate name, potbelly. Potbelly stoves are tremendous heaters. These vintage stoves burn both wood or coal and can be converted to gas. Potbelly stoves come in three sizes:LARGE, MEDIUM and SMALL with burn times ranging from 6 to 8 hours for the small, up to 8 to 14 hours in a large potbelly stove.
	A LARGE potbelly stove could comfortably warm a dance hall in Tombstone from dusk til dawn. A MEDIUM stove could keep the conversation cozy in a general store starting with lunch and going through dinner. A SMALL potbelly stove kept a station agent snugly in his railroad office for an entire work day, plus overtime.
Many potbelly stoves feature cooktops for simmering coffee, scrambling eggs, or making chili. The ring around the middle of a potbelly stove was designed to prevent folks from bumping into the bulge of the stove and burning themselves. Other features found on potbelly stoves include: swing feed doors, large ash pits, cast iron foot rails, and draft controls.
An antique potbelly stove in an “old west” hotel
Although the function of a potbelly stove has made it a popular heater, it is the aesthetics that have made the stove legendary. Potbelly stoves embody history and tradition. They are superbly crafted American artifacts that warm both the body and the spirit. A potbelly stove beckons you to come and warm yourself by it. To share stories and a hot cup of coffee. To listen for the whistle of the train, or a boisterous tune on the upright piano in the saloon.
Cowboys enjoying the saloon and vintage potbelly stove
POTBELLY STOVES IN SETTINGS
Potbelly stoves have been serving as centerpieces for America’s social activities for well over a hundred years. The portly stove has warmed many historic places including: general stores, schoolhouses, railroad stations, frontier establishments and have been featured in paintings, Americana art and Hollywood westerns.
VINTAGE POTBELLY STOVES IN GENERAL STORES
	“Come and sit for a spell,” the potbelly stove beckoned. And folks did. Potbelly stoves were the hearth and heart of not only the general store, but the community as well. Sitting by the potbelly stove, sharing a cup of coffee and the news and gossip of the town was how information was gathered and shared throughout the community.
Politics, gossip, the weather. Standard conversational topics shared and debated about, all around the potbelly stove in the general store. Imagine the stories these welcome warmers could share.
CLASSIC POTBELLY STOVES IN OLD SCHOOL HOUSES
	Walking to school, sometimes for miles, like our grandfolks often told us, could be a tad chilly and wintery Thankfully, the youngin’s had a potbelly stove waiting in the schoolhouse ready to keep them warm during their studies. As they wrote about the three R’s on their small chalkboards, the good ole potbelly stove blanketed the room with warmth.
At lunchtime, the teacher would often cook soups and stews on the potbelly stove providing nourishing lunches for the students. After lunch, schoolboys would split wood for the stove. If the teacher was more charm and less “marm” the boys would give an extra hearty effort in their wood duties.
VINTAGE POTBELLY STOVES IN HISTORIC RAILROAD STATIONS
Travelers found warmth and comfort sitting by the potbelly stove waiting for a train to arrive to take them to new and exciting places or for a loved one to return home. Potbelly stoves warmed railroad stations, depots, and station agent offices all around the country.
Relaxing at the end of the day by the potbelly stove.
POTBELLY STOVES IN TRADITIONAL FRONTIER ESTABLISHMENTS
Vintage potbelly stove in watch and clock maker’s shop
Antique potbelly stove in an old west Newspaper Office
Daydreaming in a bookstore by a warm potbelly stove
Antique potbelly stove warming a vintage mercantile store
AMERICAN ART FEATURING POTBELLY STOVES
Original Frank and Johnnie drawing by Thomas Benton Frankie and Johnnie Were Sweethearts “Frankie went to the Dance Hall, she rang the Dance Hall bell, She said, “Clear out, you people, I’m going to blow this man to hell: He was my man - and he done me wrong.” “Frankie shot Johnnie the first time, Frankie shot Johnnie twice; Frankie shot Johnnie the third time, and she took that gambler’s life. He was her man - but he done her wrong.”
Line drawing by D. Marga of a general store
	A vintage potbelly stove keeping a calendar girl cozy
Grooving by a potbelly stove in a custom-made hippy van, Hot Rod Magazine 1974
	NORMAN ROCKWELL
	Norman Rockwell is about as American as apple pie, baseball, Sears Roebuck and a potbelly stove. He illustrated numerous scenes that featured a potbelly stove, with many of those illustrations gracing the cover of the Saturday Evening Post.
Whether it was a couple registering to get married or a grandpa playing checkers with his grandson, Norman Rockwell knew that the potbelly stove was an important and sentimental part of American life.
	To learn more about Norman Rockwell, please visit the Norman Rockwell Museum, www.nrm.org
HOLLYWOOD WESTERNS STARRING VINTAGE POTBELLY STOVES
Potbelly stoves have often appeared in Hollywood movies warming up jailhouses, saloons or simmering Tom Selleck’s coffee in a Louis L’Amour remake, or his own personal bunkhouse. In this scene, from the John Ford classic, Cheyenne Autumn, Richard Widmark whispers sweet nothings to Carrorl Baker in her classroom.
In the 1968 movie Bandolero, starring Jimmy Stewart, Dean Martin, and Raquel Welch, Raquel “plows beautifully backwards into a potbelly stove.” It’s a classic scene where the potbelly stove often gets credit in the movie reviews.
Below is a scene from the 1936 20th Century Fox film, “The Country Doctor”.
“Wash your own clothes, doc, the water’s on the potbelly stove.”
HAPPY GOOD TIME STOVE CUSTOMERS
Satisfied Good Time Stove Co. customers proudly displaying their antique potbelly stove
Our classic potbelly stove keeps this lighthouse warm
CATALOGS
Potbelly stoves were featured in various stove manufacturer’s catalogs as well as other consumer catalogs including Montgomery Ward, Henry Clark’s General Supply Catalog, Glenwood, Crawford and by far the most popular, the Sears and Roebuck catalog.
The catalogs provided images of the potbelly stoves and descriptions that highlighted the function, operation and aesthetics of the stove. SAMPLE CATALOG TEXT: “Potbelly stoves are ruggedly built heating stoves with a solid cast iron body that is closely fitted, braced and bolted making the stove incredibly strong, sturdy, reliable and durable.”
Click here to view more catalog pages
VINTAGE TRADE CARDS
Trade cards were used like business cards in selling products. Enchanting, romantic, humorous, nostalgic and pleasing images appeared on the front of the card with sales and contact information found on the flip side.
FACTORY INFORMATION
Potbelly stoves were manufactured by a wide variety of companies including Glenwood, Crawford, Jewel, Kalamazoo, Red Cross, Winter, Acme and Sears.
	The Boston and Maine Railroad Company crafted their own potbelly stoves and used them to warm their railroad stations, train depots, box cars and even in the caboose.
The ACME Stove Company was one of the premiere manufacturers of potbelly stoves. They sold their stoves in the Sears Roebuck mail order catalogs.
The Sears Roebuck Company sold a variety of potbelly stoves in their catalogs, which they referred to as Cannon Stoves. In addition to the regular Sears Roebuck catalogs that sold everything from clothes to farm equipment, Sears Roebuck distributed catalogs dedicated entirely to heating stoves and kitchen ranges.
Sears also sold their own stoves, the Wehrle stoves, as well as the Acme stoves. Sears Roebuck purchased, what they claimed to be, “the largest stove factory in the world,” in Newark, Ohio. The mammoth stove foundry was operated by the Wehrle brothers, William and August. The Wehrle brothers had an exemplary reputation for crafting quality heating stoves and ranges.
Sears and Roebuck firmly believed that every home in the country should have a heating stove and kitchen range and they were just the company to accomplish it. Sears, which in the early 1900’s was strictly a mail order company, distributed their stove catalogs to every community in the country that had access to the postal system or railroad. They had a distribution of product system unrivaled by any other that could get the stoves to the consumer in a timely fashion.
	In addition to the Wehrle stoves, the Sears and Roebuck Company highlighted a couple of potbelly stoves in their catalogs, the Acme Cannon Heating Stove and the Acme Giant. Both potbelly stoves lived up to their name, Acme, which means “the peak or top of something.” Acme was a generic brand name used for a wide variety of products back in the first half of the 1900’s. The word was used like a proper name much like “American” and “National” are used today.
© Warner Bros.
Perhaps the most famous consumer of Acme products was Wile E. Coyote. He tirelessly purchased Acme products to use in his deadly pursuit of the Road Runner. Maybe if he had purchased an Acme Cannon Heating Stove his goals would have been realized.
FOUNDER INFORMATION
Richard Warren Sears was the founder of the Sears Roebuck Company and served as president from 1886 to 1908.
Born in Stewartville, Minnesota in 1863, Richard Warren Sears’ first job was as a station agent for the railroad in North Redwood, Minnesota. His station agent’s office was kept cozy and warm on bitter cold Minnesota days by a potbelly stove.
Vintage potbelly stove in Richard W. Sears’ railroad office
At the tender age of 26, in the late 1800’s, Richard Sears became the president of the Sears Roebuck company, a company that he nurtured into the most popular and enduring mail order catalog company in the history of the country.
As president, Sears made it his mission to provide the American public with just about every product they could possibly need or want. He turned his focus on stoves, knowing full well, that every home and every business in the growing nation needed a stove to keep warm and cook food. He created catalogs dedicated to selling heating stoves and kitchen ranges, astutely purchased his own stove manufacturing foundry and proudly marketed his stoves…
	including the beloved potbelly stove which had once kept him warm during the blustery Minnesota winters when he was a station agent.
Thank you for traveling back in time with us and visiting the potbelly stove – a true American icon. We hope you’ll continue to explore our site and get to know the diverse, vintage and exquisitely crafted stoves we have in our collection. Like the potbelly stoves, they’re all gems, functional pieces of art that will warm and enhance any room.
My beautiful daughter, Sara, the stove princess, will be delighted to assist you in any way. stoveprincess@goodtimestove.com