As many as 8 out of 10 allergy sufferers have allergy symptoms year-round due to indoor air particles. Perennial allergy symptoms can be controlled by improving indoor air quality with air cleaners. These days, there are so many options for air cleaning: furnace filters, HEPA air purifiers, ionic air cleaners, humidifiers that wash the air, ozone generators, and whole house air purification systems. How did we get this far with air cleaning technology?

You may think that air purification is a new craze, but in actuality, it dates much farther back than most people realize. Although antiquated, various types of air purification have been around for more than 200 years. Since the early 1800s, scientists have been working on ways to make our air cleaner. At the start of the industrial revolution in the United States, John and Charles Dean developed a mask for firefighters in 1823, allowing firefighters to enter burning buildings without being overcome by dangerous smoke fumes.

As the Industrial Revolution really took hold in America, coal burning became a basic way of life throughout growing cities. Utilizing coal allowed engineers to produce electricity and fuel to power trains and heat homes. However, as coal became a central resource for growing city life, the air became polluted with smoke and dark clouds of smog.

It was not until 1854 that John Stenhouse developed a mask worn by divers and coal miners to protect against polluted air. Stenhouse’s mask was based on a charcoal-based filter design, similar to some of the carbon filters used in air purifiers today. These masks filtered many air impurities and made tremendous advancements in the field of air purification. Using charcoal in his air filters enabled Stenhouse to filter out more harmful, noxious gases from the air than previous filtration masks. In 1871, John Tyndall upgraded the original firefighter masks created by the Deans, introducing a respirator to aid in the breathing for firefighters. The combination of the respirator device and filtration system became early precursors to today’s respirator masks.