How a simple coffee can changed the way we grill

During the current recession much has been made about the fact that we Americans are the smartest in the world and that if we only keep inventing we can invent ourselves out of our troubles.

The automobile is a prime example of where Americans stick out their chest with pride and say, “Look at us. We did it first!�

Only we didn’t. In the late 1800s, long before Henry Ford built his Model T sometime around 1913, the French, English and Germans had built automobiles, first powered by steam and then by gasoline. But what they didn’t do — and this is where Americans excel —  they didn’t build factories and market them.

Everyone thinks that Ford figured out and devised the assembly line. Wrong. Ransome Olds built the first assembly line and started making cars named, you guessed it, Oldsmobiles. But it was a heavy, expensive machine.

Ford’s genius was building a big assembly line and manufacturing thousands of inexpensive Model Ts, the car that forever changed the way we live in America.

At the same time, Herr Benz and Herr Daimler were making cars in Germany, but slowly and not with the high-powered assembly line that Ford introduced. Herr Benz, I’m sure you remember, had a daughter named Mercedes.

There are other inventions that Americans claim we devised first, but you have to check with the Chinese, whose list of firsts is overwhelming. Gun powder that changed the way we kill each other on a large scale is probably their best known, and of course dubious, contribution to mankind.

All this is by way of introducing my late best friend, Elias Rosenthal, known most of his life to his wife, my cousin Rosalie, friends and associates, as Kiki.

Fifty-plus years ago we were invited to Crescent Beach in Niantic to spend the day with Kiki and family at the summer cottage they had rented.

Rosalie had planned to grill hot dogs and hamburgers on a typical charcoal fire grill of the time. Fact is, I doubt if gas-powered grills were in use in those days. Mr. Weber, I can only guess, was still thinking about it.

To fire up a charcoal grill in those days you had several choices: Gather a bunch of sticks, lay them in the center of the grill and pile the charcoal on in a mound. Light the sticks and when the fire had reached the top of the pile, spread out the charcoal and wait until the coals had burned down and were too hot to handle. Then start cooking the dogs and burgers.

Folks who didn’t have access to sticks fired up the charcoal pile with crumpled up newspapers.

And nearly everybody sprinkled charcoal lighter on the pile to give it a boost. Sometimes the manager of the grill, nearly always the husband, came a cropper. He kept shooting charcoal lighter at the pile and alas, flames flew up the stream through the air to the hand that held the can. Butter on burns was the conventional remedy at the time.

So who invented what and didn’t know it?

Kiki.

Kiki was a graduate of Yale, a Naval officer during the war and later an engineer for what was then named Hamilton Standard. It was the division of United Aircraft (now United Technologies) that made propellers for the company’s famed Pratt & Whitney engines.

We had just come in off the beach, were dried off and hungry as wolves. Rosalie gave the order: “Kiki, fire up the grill!�

Kiki took a large empty coffee can and sliced off the bottom with an old-fashioned can opener. He put the can on the grill, stuffed crumpled newspaper in the bottom and filled the can with charcoal. He lifted the can just enough so he could light the paper. And lo, the paper lit the coals, and in half the time it took with an open pile, the coals were burning and ready to be spread out and do their thing.

Go to any hardware store today and you can buy a specially made can with a handle and holes to allow air in. What are they for? To ignite charcoal on a barbecue!

I don’t know how many are made and sold each year, and I don’t know if they are patented.

But Kiki did it first—and didn’t know he had an invention on his hands!

So everyone tinkering in a garage shop in America today, I call on you to invent us out of the recession. It doesn’t have to be a rocket to another galaxy. A simple gadget like a charcoal lighter may do the trick.

Freelance writer Barnett Laschever of Goshen still has one of the first charcoal cans with a handle. He calls it his “Kiki Can.� He also has written five children’s books, is co-author of a guide to Connecticut and writes this vinegary column for The Lakeville Journal.