This of course sent me into my regular research rabbit hole that could not be satisfied until I got to look at one and handle it personally. But before we get into that, a personal story and connection.

My father was a truck driver in the late 1970’s through the 1980’s, one of my distinct memories of my father is him using his Aladdin Stanley thermos which he would take hunting and other outdoor uses. There is a special connection I have with that simple object that was little more than a tool for my father. Now that he has passed I treasure those connections and I have since impressed upon my own children an appreciation for a hot cup of coffee on a cold day poured from a Stanley thermos. This is what I love about material artifacts, one can touch it and relate to the past and make connections to the present. Cause and effect are all around us, just like I tell my students! Now, grab a cup of something warm, sit back and allow me to tell you a story that connects the big powerhouses of electricity, Nikola Tesla and George Westinghouse, to the hero of our tale William Stanley Jr. …

The Stanley Bottle Company was founded by New York born William Stanley Jr. in 1913 when he was fifty five years old…if you do the math you will find he was born right before the American Civil War in 1858! He came to working maturity age the same time electricity was becoming all the rage. By the time William was 25 in 1883, Ohio born Thomas Edison’s first electrical plant powered up. This new technology and era was was going to lead William Stanley Jr. to contribute to making the working person’s day just a little bit better.

So how does William Stanley, George Westinghouse, Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison connect? Well, cause and effect of course! You probably learned about Thomas Edison inventing the lightbulb in grade school and if you heard about Nikola Tesla it was probably in relation to the contemporary Tesla electric car or the Tesla Coils and if you have a few years under your belt you may remember Westinghouse being a household name. Thomas Edison employed Nikola Tesla to work on getting direct current to be more reliable and stronger over long distances so it could connect miles of homes together instead of several community blocks. Nikola Tesla discovered alternating current was better suited for this but Thomas Edison disagreed and would not support Tesla’s research in that direction so Nikola quit and took his research elsewhere. To start his own laboratory he needed investors and George Westinghouse was very interested in this new technology that had the public interest and excitement so he backed Tesla financially.

Now here enters the hero of our story, William Stanley Jr. William was hired by Westinghouse as the chief engineer and was tasked to work on supporting Nikola Tesla’s goal or power transmission. To this end William Stanley Jr. designed the transformer that would be used to solve the A/C transmission problem in 1885. Stanley broke out on his own starting the Stanley Electric Manufacturing Company in Pittsfield, Massachusetts in 1890. In 1903 Thomas Edison’s General Electric Company purchased majority shares in Stanley’s company which directly tied him to Thomas Edison himself. In this series of events William Stanley used a welding process and his knowledge about insulators to solve one of humanity’s greatest problem, how to keep a pot of coffee hot for a day’s worth of work…after all a person needed to stay caffeinated right? The insulated bottles at the turn of the 20th century had a glass core which was prone to cracking and breaking if dropped or extreme temperature changes, which of course would ruin a person’s cup o’ joe, tea, or favorite soup.

To solve this problem, in 1913 William Stanley invented and designed his vacuum bottles with two steel walls, which used the welding technique he learned while working with transformers, and filled the open space between the steel walls with charcoal dust providing not only insulation for heat and cold but also strength for durability. William Stanley Jr. was so confident in his invention and process that he labeled his bottles with the slogan “It will not break”. This was the manufacturing process that gave the company the Char-Vac trademark which lasted until 2009 when the company stopped using charcoal as the insulating method between the two steel walls. The company started full production in 1915 which takes us to the model in the picture and in my YouTube video! If you are interested in enjoying a hot beverage outdoors or at work you can purchase a quality Stanley thermos using my Amazon affiliate link by clicking the pic below, doing so will support my family and future efforts. Thanks for stopping by!