page_title: Charles S.L. Baker
section_title: Invention
hierarchical_section_title: Charles S.L. Baker / Invention
caption_attribution_description: English: Black and white photograph showing inventor Charles S.L Baker and another man demonstrating heating/radiator system.
context_page_description: Charles S. L. Baker was an American inventor, who patented the friction heater.
context_section_description: Baker worked over the span of decades on his product, attempting several different forms of friction, including rubbing two bricks together mechanically, as well as using various types of metals. After twenty-three years, the invention was perfected in the form of two metal cylinders, one inside of the other, with a spinning core in the center made of wood, that produced the friction. Baker started a business with several other men to manufacture the heater. The Friction Heat & Boiler Company was established in 1904, in St. Joseph, with Baker on the board of directors. The company worked up to 136,000 dollars in capital, equal to nearly 4 million dollars in 2018.
  Mr. Baker claims that the particular mode of power used in creating the friction is not essential. It may be wind, water, gasoline, or any other source of energy. The most difficult part of the inventor's assertions to prove is that his system will light or heat a house at about half the cost of methods  now in use.
caption: Black and white photograph showing inventor Charles S.L Baker and his assistant demonstrating heating/radiator system.
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