@dyslexia,
You've misplaced your refrigerator with a Coolerator.
Coolerators worked only in very dry country, and best in dry, windy country. Of course, that describes most of West Texas, so there's where you found 'em. A coolerator was a cabinet that looked a lot like an old-fashioned pie safe, but instead of having a wooden back and punched-tin sides and doors, the coolerator's back, sides, and doors were covered in fine-mesh screen wire. The top and bottom were solid, and the cabinet stood about a foot off the floor on spindly wooden legs. Each leg was immersed in a 1-lb coffee can half full of kerosene. This kept crawling or climbing insects out of the coolerator. The screenwire sides and doors kept out the fliers. Inside there were three or four shelves for perishable foods.
The important part of the coolerator was not the cabinet, but that which kept it cool. A large pan, usually sheet metal, was placed atop the coolerator and filled about half way with water. A woolen blanket was draped over the pan, to hang all the way to the bottom of the coolerator cabinet on all sides. Often this was two or three threadbare woolen blankets sewn together, which would be used on beds in the winter. Atop the blanket, to sink it into the water, there was a brick or large rock.
The woolen blanket wicked the water down on all sides of the coolerator, and the ever-present Texas wind, blowing through the blanket, cooled the food inside through evaporation. With the coolerator set on a shaded but mostly-open porch, milk, butter, eggs, and other perishables stayed remarkably cool during the hot spring, summer, or fall of the year. With the coming of REA and electricity to rural Texas, coolerators and their kin vanished, to be replaced by electric refrigeration. They were not greatly missed.
http://www.texasescapes.com/CFEckhardt/Coolerator.htm
