The Forgotten Art of Building A Good Fireplace
Vrest Orton loved the five fireplaces in his 1828 Federal brick house in Weston, Vermont because of their architectural beauty and because of the enormous amount of heat they produced without letting smoke into the rooms. In his quest to understand why his old fireplaces worked so much better than most "modern" versions, Orton discovered the work of Count Rumford, the eighteenth-century genius who brought fireplace design to an unprecedented level of efficiency.Born Benjamin Thompson in Woburn, Massachusetts in 1753, Rumford was a Tory during the American Revolution, and he emigrated to Britain. While in Britain, he applied himself to the study and improvement of smoky fireplaces, and had so much success that his fame spread to Europe. In Bavaria, his contributions to society were so appreciated that he was ennobled as "Count of the Holy Roman Empire" by the Elector of Bavaria. He took the name "Rumford" from the old name for Concord, New Hampshire.In this book, Vrest Orton recounts the fascinating story of Count Rumford. He then goes on to spell out Rumford's basic principals of fireplace design with the help of drawings by Austin Stevens. Since its original publication in 1969, this book has gone through numerous printings and has brought about a revival of the Rumford fireplace.Vrest Orton served in France during World War I, had a distinguished career in book and magazine publishing for twenty years, and then moved back to Vermont after Pentagon service following World War II to found the Vermont Country Store, which issues one of America's most trusted and popular mail-order catalogs.This new edition included some notes and clarification by Wally Leeds, a mason in Tunbridge, Vermont who had built many Rumford fireplaces. In addition, there is a preface by Lyman Orton, son of Vrest Orton.