Do Elephants Jump? (11 page)

Even low-end freezers have a spot designated for ice making, while expensive freezers feature automatic ice makers that promise everything but frozen margaritas. We’ve often wondered whether there is a reason for the location of the ice section of the freezer. Our experts say: Yes!

If heat rises, why are the ice compartments usually on the top? On most freezers, the evaporator, the metal tubing that converts a liquid refrigerant into cold vapor, is located on the top of the freezer. The ice trays then benefit from actual contact with the cooling source, and thus chill partly via conduction. The ice section of the freezer is usually located in the coldest possible spot.

A freezer is supposed to provide a cold temperature throughout the entire unit. But in practice, folks at home tend to jam freezer shelves with frozen waffles, ice cream, mysterious Ziploc bags, and leftover meat that will never be seen and certainly not eaten again. Dick Stilwill, of the National Appliance Parts Suppliers Association, implores us to unstuff our freezer:

What’s so important about airflow in a freezer? When you place an ice tray with cold water in the freezer, the temperature of the water is obviously higher than the rest of the freezer. So as the water in the tray starts to freeze, there is some evaporation. This evaporation creates a thin layer of air just above the cubes that is slightly warmer than the rest of the freezer compartment. If the air in the freezer doesn’t circulate, this little layer of warmth will slow down the progression of ice formation. The solution is to blow away the warmer air and bring in the ambient temperature of the freezer.

In the ice tray department, there is plenty of space for air circulation. But if you crammed the same-temperature water in the same ice tray and wedged it in between, say, your Weight Watchers frozen dinner and your gallon of Häagen Dazs chocolate chocolate chip, there is nowhere for the warm layer of air above the cold water to go. You didn’t know it, but every time you fill your ice tray with water and place it in the designated area, you are proudly exhibiting the powers of convection, as physicist John Di Bartolo, of Polytechnic University in Brooklyn, New York, explains:

A fan not only circulates the air but also increases evaporation in the water — if there is less water to chill, ice will be formed more quickly.

Barring serious malfunctions, ice trays will “work” anywhere in the freezer, but with the power of conduction and convection on your side, why not do the right thing?

The history of fraternities in the United States goes back before there
was
a United States — to colonial Williamsburg. We could understand it if social clubs were named after English letters, but why Greek, when few if any of these societies’ members were of Greek heritage?

When you think of fraternities, three words spring to mind: Greek, secrecy, and beer. The first college social club for men, the Flat Hat Club, was formed in 1750, and embraced secrecy and beer, but left out the Greek. The Flat Hat Club was a secret society (with a name like that, who could blame them?), formed at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. Members met at the Raleigh Tavern in Williamsburg, and although the club seems to have had no academic pretensions, its members were far from ne’er-do-wells — one Flat Hatter was a young Thomas Jefferson. The Flat Hat Club did have a secret badge and secret handshake.

Not long after, “literary societies” started popping up in several colleges. Literary societies ostensibly helped students with academics, but often were excuses for students to talk about issues that were proscribed in classes. Curricula tended to focus on the “classics” (for example, both Latin and Greek languages were required for all undergraduates at William and Mary), but many students wanted to discuss what they considered to be more pressing and immediate problems, such as the impending break with England. The Flat Hat Club seems to have died within two decades, but the P.D.A. Society at William and Mary seems to have taken its place, and its letters were taken from the Greek alphabet (Phi Delta Alpha, presumably).

John Heath, a young Greek scholar, was denied admission to theP.D.A. Club at William and Mary and, undeterred, decided to form a secret society of his own where scholarship, as well as social interaction, would be prized. On December 5, 1776, the first meeting of Phi Beta Kappa was held at the ubiquitous Raleigh Tavern. PBK started with a nucleus of Heath and four of his friends but, influenced by Free masonry, soon built chapters on other campuses (for example, Phi Beta Kappa’s Yale chapter started in 1780, and Harvard’s one year later). In the beginning, PBK’s activities were secretive. This was because, like the literary societies, Heath and friends wanted to talk about issues that couldn’t be discussed in the classroom, and also because secret rituals, handshakes, mottoes, and membership badges were ways to bond the members (and perhaps to feel superior to students denied access to the symbols of PBK).

Virtually all of today’s Greek societies borrowed elements of Phi Beta Kappa. Why did PBK’s founder choose its name? John Churchill, secretary of the Phi Beta Kappa Society, wrote to us:

The three Greek letters that formed PBK’s name were the letters that formed the initials of its secret motto — a choice that would be echoed by virtually every long-lasting Greek organization, even if the phrase itself remains secret to outsiders.

As the decades rolled on, Phi Beta Kappa distinguished itself from other societies by focusing on academics, and in the 1830s, when much opposition was waged against secret societies, PBK abandoned its tradition of secrecy. William Morgan, a disgruntled Royal Arch Mason, threatened to expose all of the secrets of the Freemasons. Morgan disappeared and many believed that the Freemasons killed him. In this atmosphere, Phi Beta Kappa decided to voluntarily abandon its underground rituals and has become an academic honorary society — membership is earned by achievement rather than invitation.

The Kappa Alpha Society, formed at Union College, in Schenectady, New York, in 1825, is the oldest of the remaining secret social societies. Clearly patterned after Phi Beta Kappa, KA established a beachhead at Union College in 1817 — indeed, KA’s two founders
were
Phi Beta Kappas.
Imponderables
has been unable to wangle how KA chose its name, but we’ll wager the society boasts a two-word Greek motto starting with K and A.

Delta Phi opened up for business in 1827, and is noteworthy for at least one reason. DP was the first secret society to call itself a fraternity. Most subsequent social societies also dubbed themselves fraternities, but in the 1830s, there was constant turmoil about whether new social societies should be secret or “open.”

The original purpose of secrecy at the societies founded at William and Mary wasn’t just to exclude non-members. Brothers wanted to avoid the censorship of discussion topics in classes, and to avoid outside interference by any officials at the school.

But many college students, especially during a climate of anti-Masonry, felt that secret societies were unnecessary. Two fraternities, founded ten years apart, illustrate the tension within the Greek movement. Delta Upsilon, formed at Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts, in 1834, was created specifically to be an anti-secretive society. Its name was derived from the motto
Dikaia Upotheke
(“justice our foundation”). Members were chosen from the top 10 percent of their class.

In 1844, Delta Kappa Epsilon was formed at Yale, and from the beginning, the fraternity was cloaked in secrecy. DKE announced that it was seeking members who were “in equal proportions the gentleman, the scholar, and the jolly good fellow.” DKE shied away from emphasizing academics, possibly because its founding members were rejected from scholastically oriented societies on campus. We will refrain from any jokes about Gerald Ford and Dan Quayle being two proud DKEs.

Through Web searches, we were able to learn that DKE has a motto that it discloses to the public
Kerothen Filoi Aie
(“friends from the heart forever”) but also a secret one,
D K Chi Epi eye Kai Aie
(“right and equity”). Neophytes in the fraternity are warned: “This secret motto should never be uttered otherwise than in a whisper and then only in the presence of those known to be Dekes.” Likewise, during induction ceremonies, neophytes are required to swear “never to reveal any part or parts of the activities upon which I now enter whether or not my initiation is successful.”

Although different fraternities have adopted different rituals, the dominance of Greek culture continues. Joe Walt, historian of Sigma Alpha Epsilon, wrote to
Imponderables
explaining why:

And what about sororities? Secret female societies didn’t even exist until two were founded at Wesleyan Female College in the 1850s (one of them later turned into Alpha Delta Pi), but then it wasn’t like women were attending college in droves in the eighteenth century. No Greek letters were associated with female societies until 1870, and the first Greek women’s group was Gamma Phi Beta — established at DePauw University in 1870.

Because of the long traditions of these societies, and their many rituals and vows of secrecy, it’s hard to imagine how they’ll ever move away from the Greek names. Perhaps this represents a marketing window for some new groups. What’s wrong with a social group with an English name and motto? We think “Joe’s Club” and “Sally’s Society” have a certain ring to them.

The kettle shape of the famous Weber Grill was initially more a matter of convenience than inspiration. George Stephen worked as a welder at the Weber Brothers Metal Works, and was frustrated by how often his grilling attempts on open braziers were foiled by wind, rain, blowing ashes, and flare-ups. By creating a deep barbecue, he helped protect food from these elements.

His job was welding metal spheres together to create buoys. According to “The Story of Weber” at www.webergrillrestaurant.com,

As public relations representative, Donna Myers, president of the DHM Group, a public relations firm that represents many clients in the barbecue field, told us: “The round kettle was pretty easy to make with no seaming.”

Stephen designed his first barbecue kettle in 1951, Weber Brothers Metal Works allowed him to stamp the kettles, and they attained success quickly. Most of our sources would concur with Bruce Bjorkman, director of marketing for Traeger Grills, about the reason why most charcoal grills ever since have been round:

No one can accuse Traeger of following in the footsteps of George Stephen — it offers barbecues in the shape (and color) of a pig and a longhorn steer (“no bull!”).

Not everyone jumped on the bandwagon, though. Many other manufacturers have and still do produce non-round charcoal grills. J. Richard Ethridge, president of Backyard Barbecues in Lake Forest, California, recalls that his company made large rectangular charcoal grills in the 1960s. But Ethridge has moved on to round barbecues with a difference — Backyard offers grills in the shape of a golf ball (perched on a tee) and an eight-ball nestled on a “cue” stand. Both of these models are available with your choice of fuel — propane, natural gas, or charcoal.

And the reverse is true as well. You can find round gas grills, such as the space-age model offered by Evo, a Beaverton, Oregon, company, which makes round gas grills with a flat, solid cooking surface. George Foreman’s outdoor grill is a propane-powered round model that looks not unlike a Weber Grill.

Bruce Bjorkman believes that the domed top of round charcoal grills might aid in creating a “convection radiant dynamic,” so that food cooks a little more evenly as heat is bouncing back in all directions. Donna Myers notes that after Weber’s success, plenty of other non-round charcoal grills, especially square-covered cookers, became quite popular and performed well:

Myers notes that the rectangular form of gas grills was almost certainly a matter of economics: “I’m not sure whether gas grill manufacturers would tell you that it was the cost that led to that shape, but I’m quite sure that was the motivation.”

We found one who was more than happy to share exactly this experience. J. Richard Ethridge points out that gas grills are more complicated to manufacture than charcoal grills:

Ethridge pointed out other issues that make it less difficult to manufacture rectangular gas grills. For technical reasons, it is easier and cheaper to craft rectangular burners, and it is difficult to disperse heat evenly when you use a rectangular burner in a round grill. Most gas grills also have attached lids, while charcoal grills do not. While it is easy to manufacture a hinge for a rectangular grill with a flat back, Ethridge found when he first manufactured the 8-Ball and Golf Ball grills, that Backyard had to design a special hinge for the round grill so that it would lift up the lid first and then open. Even Weber, whose round kettles dominate the charcoal grill market, manufactures rectangular gas grills, presumably for economic reasons.

We were curious about whether Weber claims any advantage to the round shape of its charcoal grills, and were a bit stunned when our query was met by this response from the legal department:

We didn’t realize that the Weber’s spherical form was a secret, but the guarded response is proof positive that in the barbecue world, it’s the steak, and the sizzle,
and
the shape that matter.