Showmen's Trade Review (Jan-Mar 1947)

E-8 SHOWMEN'S TRADE REVIEW. January 4. 1947 Modern Sanitation Cfe&HS the Aik Pure Air For Patrons' Lungs Held To Be More Vital Than Clean Floors For Their Shoes Housecleaning is as old as houses. But it has always been limited to cleaning surfaces: floor and wall and ceiling surfaces and the surfaces of furnishings. Air cleaning is new. It is not done by porters, but by chemicals or machines. A modern age agrees that it is even more important to give people clean air for their lungs than to give them clean floors for the soles of their shoes. One obvious way of providing clean air is ventilation — but considerations of economy interpose obvious limitations to this common-sense solution. A theatre must be heated in winter and usually is cooled in summer. Over-zealous ventilation would amount to trying to heat or cool all outdoors. Heated air must be conserved; expensively cooled air must be re-circulated. Hence, a substantial part of the air is kept in the house for substantial period of time — and cleaned. A ir Cleaners There are now chemical, electrical, mechanical and ultra-violet air cleaners. They are not mutually exclusive; different kinds can be used together in any desired combination. Chemical air cleaners consist of agents that remove odors by combining with the odoriferous molecules, changing them into entirely different substances. They disinfect by combining with, and thus killing, germs and viruses in the air. Odor-hiding chemicals are of an entirely different nature: they are like a loud noise that masks a whisper — but the whisper is still there! Their use is necessary where ventilation is so inadequate (particularly while the theatre is crowded) that no effort can keep the air clean. Further, their use is indicated for audiences of the type that welcome the presence of such smelly stuff as a sign that the theatre has been "disinfected." Such audiences are becoming fewer, and new theatres need to be designed with ventilating provisions that make mere smellhiders unnecessary. However, genuinely useful and valuable air-borne disinfectants, not smelly in themselves, are sometimes combined with odorous ingredients which have no cleansing or germicidal value but favorably impress the type of patrons that are favorably impressed by that sort of thing. Electrical air-cleaners are of two general kinds. The precipitator utilizes highvoltage electric charges. Air is blown past metal surfaces carrying a strong charge; particles carried in the air stream acquire the same charge by electro-static induction. The air then passes metal sur faces charged at the opposite polarity and the opposite charges attract — the particles cling to this second set of surfaces and are thus removed from the air stream. Germs, the grains of tobacco smoke — all kinds of microscopic and sub-microscopic impurities — are trapped in this way. The precipitating device is cleaned when a sufficient quantity of them has accumulated. A second type of electrical air-cleaner operates by producing an air-cleaning chemical: ozone. This gas is unstable. It rapidly breaks down into ordinary oxygen, but in so doing oxidizes odorous gases, germs, viruses — anything oxidizable with which it comes into contact. Mechanical air cleaning is of three kinds. In some conditioning systems air is literally washed with water, being blown through a water-spray. In others it is filtered by being blown through mats of fibrous construction. Dust is removed in this way, but very small impurities such as viruses may possibly get through. The filter mats are washed or discarded from time to time, depending on the material of which they are made. A third method depends on the gas mask principle; the air stream is passed through cartridges of porous carbon, which attracts and holds objectionable particles by adsorption, exactly as in a gas mask. The smallest particles are trapped, including viruses and grains of smoke. Ultra violet germicidal lamps provide radiation of a wave-length that kills germs and viruses, and chemically disrupts some types of odor-causing impurities. These lamps also have a double-barreled action, HIGH POWER and light weight are combined in this Super-Service theatre vacuum cleaner. Design based on highspeed motor and modern core materials makes possible a one-half horsepower unit which weighs less than thirty-six pounds for motor, bag and cord, but is rated to move 113 cubic feet of air per minute at a velocity of two and a half miles per minute. (#2). for in addition to the direct result of their rays they generate ozone, providing chemical as well as radiant cleansing. Any of these methods of air-cleaning can, as said, be used alone or in combination with others; they can be installed openly in the theatre or be concealed in its ventilating ducts. Selection among them, or choice of any combination of them, will depend on the situation of the theatre, its needs, and its previously installed heating or conditioning equipment. Protecting the Air Conventional surface-cleaning — the age-old type of housecleaning — is done partly for the sake of protecting the cleanliness of the air. Of course surfaces should be clean in themselves. But what harm is done by an incrustation inside the drain pipe of a plumbing fixture? Nobody touches it or comes in physical contact with it. Nevertheless, it is well-known that incrustations and soil of every kind must be scrupulously cleaned from every square inch of washroom surface outside the water-traps of the plumbing (using cleaning and disinfecting compounds suited to just that work) or odors and probably germs will be emitted into the air. Similarly if dust and germs are left in the carpet, passing feet will scuff them up. Dirt and dust — and germs — from high ledges and from behind pictures, will be drifted into the air by vibration and drafts if such surfaces are left unattended. Air cleaning is more difficult and costly than cleaning surfaces. For this reason alone, and regardless of the surfaces themselves, all surfaces including hidden ones are scrupulously janitored in any well-kept theatre. Surface Cleaning "If he had any brains he wouldn't be pushing a broom." This is the standard formula used by the experienced and successful assistant manager of a very large New York theatre whenever he has occasion to explain to his subordinates why they must watch every detail of a porter's work. He doesn't mean it literally. After his trainees are a bit further along in their understanding of housekeeping repsonsibilities, he stresses that it is often possible to find individuals of intelligence and diligence who for some reason among life's accidents are doing porter work, and that this is the type to be sought out and made chief porter. But even good fortune in finding such a chief does not relieve management from (Continued on Page E-18)