Underneath the ices

Jim Moran was the publicist responsible for selling fridges to Eskimos when he famously teamed up “Refridgerator” with American Airlines. American Airlines virgin flight to Alaska needed publicity as well as “Refridgerator’s” first Ice Box.

Moran organised the transport of the ice box on the first flight to Alaska, which brought about the publicity stunt to sell fridges to Eskimos. The first sale of a fridge in the U. S. was actually a milestone in the history of modern household management. At first, the appliance was no more than an exotic luxury item, so Moran sought to bring it to a much wider market. He had more ideas for European promotional activity which involved using enterologists to squeeze themselves into “Refridgerator” fridges in every major European town.

People flocked to see these new kitchen implements and the grown men and women who had managed to contort their bodies in such a way to fit inside the fridges. The stunt and the fridges were so ahead of their time that even a sub editor of a German magazine climbed into one of the fridges in Hamburg and asked the question “Is this some new conservation process?”

This picture then became inadvertantly responsible for the deaths of hundreds of children all over Europe when they too climbed into fridges thinking it was a game. For generations after the first fridge was sold, the apocryphal “never climb inside a fridge” message was issued to children by their parents with more force than “don’t talk to strangers”. Strangely enough, I myself represented a famous enterologist named Hugo Zamorette, who could squeeze himself into a 5 litre bottle. It was an amazing feat, and one that links me to Jim Moran, who used the first enterologists all those years ago.