# How did people survive in the cold before heaters?



## AlwaysOnTheOutside (Jan 11, 2010)

I know they lit fires and stuff, but I don't know how it would get warm enough. Last night it was like 10 degrees out and so back in the day without the best insulation techniques and no heaters, how did they not freeze to death? I would have been complaining non-stop and moved to Florida if I lived back then.


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## AstronautsGrapes (Sep 29, 2009)

Wear layers & acclimate to the cold weather i guess, lol. Would have sucked to be them.


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## ryobi (Jan 13, 2009)

the boy who was raised by wolves ran around in the snow barefoot, without clothes and was comfotable...

the body seems to acclimate to its surroundings


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## nubly (Nov 2, 2006)

when i was in the army, we used a pot-bellied stove inside the tent when we were out in the woods. it worked very well. when we were sleeping away from the tents we just froze.

in korea they built the old houses with some type of heating system on the floor. not sure how that works but it keeps the houses very warm. in the little mexican town my parents are from, they dont have any type of heating system aside from layers.


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## dullard (Aug 4, 2008)

I live with wood heat and it is more than sufficient.


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## GrimedMechanic86 (Jan 20, 2010)

well people wore heavy clothes (mostly furs) to keep the cold out and they ate fatty foods to sort of "insulate" themselves further. If conditions were right you can build yourself an igloo or just dig a hole in a hill downwind.


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## estse (Nov 18, 2003)

pee baths


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## Akane (Jan 2, 2008)

Wood stoves or fire places. Trees were cleared and wood was collected every year for the winter. Some people still do and whenever we have a tree go down someone always comes along and offers to pay us to let them chop it up and take the wood for their stove. 

Houses were smaller or if you had a large house you closed off part of it for the winter so you only heated 1 or 2 rooms and everyone spent their time in that room. Cooking of meals was done every evening (no microwaving) which helped produce heat. When our furnace was going nuts for awhile we put a ham in the oven which takes hours and hours to cook and raised the temp in the house several degrees. Then ran a propane space heater in the bedroom and left the rest of the house cold. This is at -10F outside. These days though doing that means you gotta watch your pipes or you might freeze and burst one in an area without heat.

Hot baths were taken just before bed to warm up and hot water bottles were placed under the sheets. This is still done in some countries. I know from my husband's time spent in Japan that they don't heat their houses much. They have huge bath tubs with digital temperature settings so you just select the temp of bath you want and it fills quick. Then you take your bath every evening so you go to bed warm. They also have heated tables to sit around during meals.

You would never be in something like a tshirt. Always layers and with blankets when sitting around. More blankets on the beds. Thick quilts. Again houses were often smaller. Having everyone sleep in the same room was not uncommon before central heating.


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## Ysonesse (Dec 25, 2009)

Hot, sweaty, primitive sex


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## ratbag (Aug 2, 2009)

Ysonesse said:


> Hot, sweaty, primitive sex


They were doing that only a couple of centuries ago?


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## Ysonesse (Dec 25, 2009)

Estelle said:


> They were doing that only a couple of centuries ago?


Especially on the frontier. It gets cold in them thar log cabins. :teeth


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## gaz (Jun 27, 2008)

That's why people had a lot of children in the old days!


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## lonelygirl88 (Dec 25, 2009)

AlwaysOnTheOutside said:


> I know they lit fires and stuff, but I don't know how it would get warm enough. Last night it was like 10 degrees out and so back in the day without the best insulation techniques and no heaters, how did they not freeze to death? I would have been complaining non-stop and moved to Florida if I lived back then.


really... you would? back in the day- they did not have air conditioning either- and insulation is not as good in the south. would you like burning up in a room when its almost 100 degrees outside? try visiting florida during a hurricane when there is no power...i wonder how you would like it.


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## lonelygirl88 (Dec 25, 2009)

i should add...you can always layer...but there is only so much you can take off.


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## Amocholes (Nov 5, 2003)

AlwaysOnTheOutside said:


> I know they lit fires and stuff, but I don't know how it would get warm enough. Last night it was like 10 degrees out and so back in the day without the best insulation techniques and no heaters, how did they not freeze to death? I would have been complaining non-stop and moved to Florida if I lived back then.


It was simply a fact of life. When winter came it got cold. You dressed in layers, ate a lot because you needed to burn more calories, you added blankets and quilts to the bed and you did not sleep alone. You had at least one brother or sister that you slept with. There were very few only children. Sometimes, the entire family would sleep in the same room so that they didn't have to heat the whole house. Houses that were built 150 years ago often had fireplaces in every room. It took a lot of work to keep a house warm (50F). Somebody had to keep the fires burning, carry the coal or chop the wood.

When I lived in California, I knew a family that lived on a ranch that had been homesteaded in 1852. The 80 yo matriarch and her 75 yo boyfriend, lived in the original house. It was heated with a fireplace in the front room and a wood cook stove in the kitchen. The bedrooms were not heated at all. that part of California the temperature rarely stayed below freezing long. It's all in what you get used to.


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## shyvr6 (Feb 18, 2008)

They used animal furs as well.


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## whiterabbit (Jan 20, 2006)

I long for the days before central heating. I don't find it to be all that necessary in the mild climate in which I live. Maybe if you're old or fragile it would be preferable, but in general I think a fireplace, extra clothing/blankets and a hot water bottle should suffice. It did back in the day. Oh, back in the day...


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## moxosis (Aug 26, 2009)

gaz said:


> That's why people had a lot of children in the old days!


 haha they did have lot more kids in the old days, one of my great grandfather had 13 kids with 3 wives, he must have been really cold.


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## pita (Jan 17, 2004)

I don't know. I am cold WITH heaters.


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## Classified (Dec 7, 2004)

There is a reason that billions of people live near the equator. My biggest goal in life is to move in that direction.


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## Amocholes (Nov 5, 2003)

Classified said:


> There is a reason that billions of people live near the equator. My biggest goal in life is to move in that direction.


To be surrounded by those billions of people? No thanks!


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## low (Sep 27, 2009)

I think people would have been slighly more used to it simply from being exposed more. It's been shown with 'Iceman' a documentary about people that deliberately sit in freezing rivers and cover in ice etc that you get more used to it.

Also houses in the past were alot more simpler, they tended to be one big room, or less rooms at least with 1 fire in the centre or main living area. 

Then the obvious thing is if you are cold then put more clothes one, use more blankets.


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## JimmyDeansRetartedCousin (Nov 28, 2009)

Hard work.


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## Post_Punk_Proclivity (Oct 12, 2008)

In colder climes in older times dwellings were made from wood. Wooden halls and cabins; when constructed correctly, have surprisingly efficient heat insulation capacity. 

Thatch was used for roofing and was made from a mixture of grass and small amounts of mud to hold it together. In combination with wooden constructs minimal heat would be lost from these dwellings.

Hearths were used in especially large halls and even smaller houses as a precursor to the modern heating apparatus.


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## Canadian Brotha (Jan 23, 2009)

I've lived & camped in the Nunavut territory here in Canada which is far north & a well made tent heated for a for hours or a well made igloo heated for a few hours along with layers & people sleeping together in a small place will keep you covered. Warm drinks are hugely important too.


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## TheGMan (Jun 10, 2004)

lonelygirl88 said:


> i should add...you can always layer...but there is only so much you can take off.


This is what I always say, and I have always preferred the cold to (extreme) heat. I would rather be without modern heat in the cold than without AC in the hot heat.


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## march_hare (Jan 18, 2006)

Effective housing and use of fires and warm clothing go a long way. But I'm inclined to believe it's a lot about their perceptions. Mind over matter if you will... I've visited recreations of Stone Age houses in Britain and they are not warm at all :/
And how about before human beings built houses? That boggles the mind....
Reminds me of an anthropology book I skimmed through once at colleg - the most primitive tribes that europeans came across in north america in their first explorations had no houses or clothes, and just slept under tree branches or shrubs at night.


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## zomgz (Aug 17, 2009)

A fireplace or fires probably =]

I wouldn't mind a fireplace myself I really love the ambient light it gives off.


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## Neptunus (Oct 29, 2007)

Well, in colonial times, wood stoves were popular. They would pipe the heat throughout the house. Also, bedpans with hot coals (I live in New England and still occasionally come across one at thrift stores), lots of woolen clothing and furs, small windows (less of a draft), and small rooms with hay used for insulation. People got creative! 

I got a pretty good taste of that kind of life last December, though, when my state got hit with this horrible icestorm - lost power for 6 days at my house! And that meant no heat or pumping water, and there was not a generator to be found in the whole state! Most horrible week of my life. In fact, there were quite a few poor souls in my town who were just off the beaten path enough so as to not have their power restored for two weeks. And it was insanely cold!!!! Wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy! :no


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## Akane (Jan 2, 2008)

You can keep putting on layers but when it's really cold you are still gonna freeze. I've gotten frostbite wearing my thinsulate boots and gloves rated to -20F with multiple pairs of socks and some thin knit gloves underneath. People die when power is lost in cold climates. People don't usually die when they lose power in hot climates unless they are too stupid to drink water and relax. It says something that you can live without AC pretty much anywhere in the world and not have too much danger unless you are really stupid but you better know what you are doing up north. About half the people that die in a power outage kill themselves with their attempted heat source. It's also illegal to turn off electricity or gas in winter here if someone does not pay their bills. You can only keep billing them until spring.


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## eagleheart (Jun 14, 2007)

It never ceases to amaze me that the First Nations of my area survived winters for millennia, and then the settlers before modern heating, I can hardly stand it and we live in a house with heat (granted we don't turn it up much for financial reasons). I personally hail the electric blanket as one of the greatest inventions known to mankind.

I can't believe I didn't use to mind the cold. Then again, I don't mind the winter as much home anymore as I do here. I'm away from home now in a place that makes me wonder how the original inhabitants as well as the first Europeans (okay, the very first didn't stick around very long) managed not to get buried under the massive snowfall or blown away by the insane wind, or both at once. I see it is currently -12 (10.4 F), feels like -23 (-9.4 F) with the wind chill, they are not kidding. It goes right through you.


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## Akane (Jan 2, 2008)

I always wonder why people wanted to spread north anyway.... What compels someone to try to live in cold with feet of snow during such times? I have enough trouble understanding why people want to do it these days but there is a lot more space and cheaper land up north along with some benefits during summer. So long as you have modern conveniences and don't do any outdoor activities you can mostly fail to notice winter going by. When you have a bunch of livestock requiring you to do chores outside not so much. My face is recovering from the 3rd time I got frost burn this year.


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## SilentLoner (Jan 30, 2006)

I'd rather be too cold than too hot. At least the cold keeps you sharp, during the summer I have trouble doing basically anything, I hate the heat.


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## eagleheart (Jun 14, 2007)

Well, I managed to enjoy winter when I was little and used to put on a snowsuit and play in snow forts. But then when you have to worry about getting the driveway plowed, clearing off your car, driving in it (to get to things that will in all likelihood not be cancelled for storms), etc. it's not exactly "magical"

And where I am now, well, I'm not Catholic like many residents but I think the pedestrians in this city might need a patron saint


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## Fuzzy Logic (Sep 16, 2009)

Most of the old buildings around where I am have really thick walls, sometimes up to a meter thick in places. It naturally keeps them warm in winter and cool in summer.


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## BeNice (Jan 2, 2004)

Amocholes said:


> To be surrounded by those billions of people? No thanks!


I'm surrounded by billions (well, millions) here in the northeast. I say no thanks to that. I'm surrounded by millions of others trapped in their homes with nothing to do, hating their lives because it's too expensive and too cold. No bang for your buck. You'd think the closer you are to palm trees and no prolonged freezing the more expensive it would be, but here up in NJ it's one of the most expensive places you can even live. We get a two and a half month long summer and you have to pay to get on the beach even if you live there, and you can't even buy beer in a grocery store.

If you really had the drive, you could go be a bum in Key West. I don't know where they sleep down there but there is a decent amount and they look healthy. At least there are always coconuts falling from the trees. There's tons of chickens walking around, too, and they don't seem to belong to anyone. You could just kill a chicken and eat coconuts. The lowest temperature was 41 during the cold wave earlier in January, and that's uncommon. I made it through two 48 degree nights in the Everglades. It was uncomfortable because I didn't have a warm enough sleeping bag and mainly just because the tent was dripping due to being old. I want to move down there when I'm old. I'll just move from campground to campground in my tent. I'll be the reject of the campground because everyone will have gigantic RV's that are as big as most people's apartments.


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## BeNice (Jan 2, 2004)

Akane said:


> You can keep putting on layers but when it's really cold you are still gonna freeze. I've gotten frostbite wearing my thinsulate boots and gloves rated to -20F with multiple pairs of socks and some thin knit gloves underneath. People die when power is lost in cold climates. People don't usually die when they lose power in hot climates unless they are too stupid to drink water and relax. It says something that you can live without AC pretty much anywhere in the world and not have too much danger unless you are really stupid but you better know what you are doing up north. About half the people that die in a power outage kill themselves with their attempted heat source. It's also illegal to turn off electricity or gas in winter here if someone does not pay their bills. You can only keep billing them until spring.


In most parts of US, you probably have a better chance of freezing to death than dying from the heat. I know everyone has their own preferences, but I think there is a point where you really have to like cold to keep living in it.


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## Post_Punk_Proclivity (Oct 12, 2008)

Amocholes said:


> To be surrounded by those billions of people? No thanks!


Hey, why not apply the same principle to living up north? Penguins do it!!


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## papaSmurf (Jun 16, 2008)

Blankets and snuggling.


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## SOME (Jul 13, 2009)

Make a big *** fire?


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## SilentWitness (Dec 27, 2009)

I have a combustion heater. 
It can get really cold up here in the mountains, and having a wood fire is kinda nice and homely.

In the old days quite a few would have perished in the winter months, especially the old and sickly. What a horrible way to go. 
I get chillblains, so I'd lose my fingers and toes pretty quick if I was stranded in the snowys.


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## UltraShy (Nov 8, 2003)

I assume many did freeze to death hundreds of years ago. Today that's a highly unlikely mode of death. But then there was a time when starvation was a common killer too.


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## Amocholes (Nov 5, 2003)

Jaiyyson said:


> Hey, why not apply the same principle to living up north? Penguins do it!!


No they don't. Penguins live in the *Ant*arctic


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## Akane (Jan 2, 2008)

Not that unlikely to freeze to death actually. Dozens do it here every year. People that go off the road in snowstorms with no way to contact anyone and without the proper items to stay alive. Of course some die because they keep the windows rolled up and the car running until they suffocate themselves instead of freezing. Some guy went out snowmobiling alone during our -20F week and his body has yet to be found. That's just one story I know of cause the search to try to find him before he froze to death was on the news site for a week. A few days at -20F (not considering windchill) and if someone hasn't turned up so far they probably aren't going to.... There are plenty more stories like that every winter. Death from the cold whether directly or indirectly is possibly more common than murder here.


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## SilentWitness (Dec 27, 2009)

Akane said:


> Not that unlikely to freeze to death actually. Dozens do it here every year. People that go off the road in snowstorms with no way to contact anyone and without the proper items to stay alive. Of course some die because they keep the windows rolled up and the car running until they suffocate themselves instead of freezing. Some guy went out snowmobiling alone during our -20F week and his body has yet to be found. That's just one story I know of cause the search to try to find him before he froze to death was on the news site for a week. A few days at -20F (not considering windchill) and if someone hasn't turned up so far they probably aren't going to.... There are plenty more stories like that every winter. Death from the cold whether directly or indirectly is possibly more common than murder here.


The same thing happens in Australia but in the desert regions for the opposite reasons. 
People go outback unprepared, their cars breakdown, they have no water and they slowly die in the scorching heat. 
No matter how many die each year, people still try and drive long distances and take the risk without water or any kind of back-up plan.


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## mind_games (Nov 30, 2008)

Lots of hug parties.


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## aguy1010 (Feb 10, 2010)

they had wood burning stoves, these can heat a whole house, at this cabin my family used to have there was one and it would get really hot, I think basically they built their homes / structures, etc around being heated by a fireplace type of thing, your normal fireplace nowadays isn't set up to work this way... I've been to old historical buildings (like museums kind of) that would have one of these wood burning stoves in the center and all rooms would basically be touching it, also their homes weren't as big as modern homes.


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