HOUSEHOLD ARTS AT THE WORLD'S FAIR. 807 



the oven which, revolves easily when it is desired to turn a pan 

 that is set upon it. Another has a round piece cut out of the 

 upper side of each cover and held in place by screws, its object 

 being to prevent cracking. Still another has one cover made up 

 of concentric rings so as to furnish five different-sized holes. 

 Mrs, Rorer exhibits at her lectures a range having a perforated 

 oven door lined with wire gauze. This, she says, enables meats 

 to be really roasted in an oven instead of being baked. A range 

 with which is combined a hot- water house-heating apparatus, the 

 invention of a Chicago woman, is also shown in the lecture room 

 and in the Manufactures Building. A long line of cooking 

 apparatus for gas is shown, at one end of which is a simple hot 

 plate and at the other a range with baking oven, broiling oven, 

 dish warmer, and water back. The larger ranges have a flue to 

 carry off the products of combustion. There is also a variety of 

 gasolene and kerosene stoves. One novelty in this line is the 

 parlor-lamp stove. It consists of an ornamental tripod supporting 

 a top on which the cooking is done, an ordinary large parlor 

 lamp being placed inside the base. When used for lighting, the 

 lamp is set on top of the tripod. Among the kitchen appliances 

 used in the New York Workingman's Home is the Aladdin oven, 

 invented by Mr. Edward Atkinson, and fully described in this 

 magazine about four years ago. 



The greatest novelty in cooking appliances at the fair is un- 

 questionably the apparatus for cooking by electricity, shown in 

 operation in the gallery of the Electricity Building. The electric 

 current is conducted into plates of enamel, where it meets with 

 resistance and is converted into heat. These plates are attached 

 to specially constructed ovens, broilers, griddles, flatirons, etc. 

 An ordinary stewpan, coffee or tea pot, or steam cooker may be 

 heated on the " disk heater." An outfit of articles necessary for 

 a private house costs $60, or $77.50 if a heater for a kitchen boiler 

 is included. Electricity has the same advantages over coal that 

 gas has ; its advantages over gas depend upon the fact that com- 

 bustion, with its needs and limitations, is wholly done away with. 

 There are no products of complete or accidentally imperfect com- 

 bustion, there is not even a slight loss of heat into the room or 

 up the flue. The strongest points of electrical cooking are com- 

 fort and convenience, but claims are made for it also on the score 

 of economy. It is said that the cost of cooking by electricity is 

 less than the cost with coal and about the same as where fuel-gas 

 is used. This is on the supposition that the electricity is fur- 

 nished at half the price charged for lighting. 



Kitchen utensils are no less well represented than are stoves 

 and ranges. The main exhibit of these is in the Manufactures 

 Building. Among them may be mentioned stamped ware enam- 



