I was having a conversation the other day with Mr. Ara Marcus Daniels, author of many plumbing books, who is quite dead. I do such things because I have time on my hands and not much of a life.
We were talking about early heating systems, Ara and I. I had questions and he had answers. When you want to know stuff about how things began, it pays to ask someone who has been dead for a while. Guys like that were there at the start and saw most of it for themselves. Or they heard the really good stories. And then they went and wrote it all down in books and magazines, which is how I get to chat with them.