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Ralph Gardner Jr: Farewell To An Old Friend

The writer’s dearly departed American Crown range
Ralph Gardner Jr.

We lost a friend, almost a family member, Tuesday afternoon. It’s not what you’re probably thinking. It wasn’t a person. It wasn’t even a pet. It was an appliance – our loyal, broad shouldered early Eighties 40” six-burner, double oven, double broiler American Crown gas range.

I didn’t expect to get choked up by its departure. My feelings for it welled up unexpectedly as the day approached for our new Zline stainless steel gas range to arrive. We didn’t purchase our new range frivolously. We’re not the kind of family that has to have the latest, biggest, best whatever it is. If technology has a leading edge we happily bring up the rear.

I’d go so far as to say most self-respecting homeowners would have dispatched our range to the dump years if not decades earlier. By the time we parted company two, perhaps three, of its burners no longer issued flame. Its right side oven hasn’t worked for years and had become a repository for baking sheets. Perhaps most egregious of all the burners’ once shimmering chrome plates, those accouterments that add charisma while capturing boiling pasta water and bubbling sauces and preventing them from percolating into the bowels of the machine had rusted almost beyond recognition.

I regret we hadn’t taken better care of the range. Friends of ours in Maine have an American Crown that’s even older and remains in pristine condition. Indeed, over the years they requested they be allowed to cannibalize hard-to-get parts should be ever get rid of our appliance.

I can’t honestly say what contributed to our negligence because, in the same way that we’re not early adaptors, we’re also reasonably careful taking care of things. My hunch is that in the chaos of child rearing wiping moisture off the chrome plates wasn’t a high priority. Also, perhaps some of the components weren’t quite as indestructible as one would have wished. American Crown went out of business not too many years after we purchased our range.

Perhaps my favorite feature because it suggests Broadway dazzle that has been lost in our less frivolous, everyone-can-aspire-to-be-a-master-chef-era, even though we rarely used it, is a backsplash that included not only a clock and timer but also a panel that, with the press of a button, displayed the American Crown logo in bright lights.

The backsplash also doubled as a shelf where we kept things like salt shakers and pepper mills for quick access, but also quirkier items such as a tiny clay model of our home created by our extremely artistically gifted older daughter; a bird-shaped brass bell just because it’s beautiful; and a small souvenir cup, apparently created to hold melted butter, because its handle comes in the shape of a lobster claw.

Our new range is “only” 36” wide, leaving a gap in the counter that will have to be addressed eventually. But most unconscionably there’s no shelf for all our bric-a-brac. One will probably have to be built. But I still haven’t addressed what it is about the loss of the old stove that almost brought me to tears. I think it has to do with the way the kitchen serves as the core of family life; the range the hearth, the kitchen’s center of gravity.

How many thousand breakfasts, lunches and dinners came into being there? How many eggs were scrambled atop those burners? How many chickens were roast in those ovens, at least the left one? It’s also where our younger daughter, now a professional chef, discovered her talents as a cook. There was lots of family history, as well as crud and congealed grease in those cracks.

We cooked on our new range for the first time Tuesday night. It looks super professional with heavy-duty stainless steel knobs, sealed Italian burners and a black porcelain cooktop. There’s only one oven but it’s twice of the size of our old one and handsomely lighted. The burners range from 4,200 up to 18,000 BTU’s, in other words from small simmer burners to flame throwers that can boil a huge pot of water pronto. The fan seems to have a mind of its own, which we may just have to learn to live with.

But overall it feels as if we’ve done the right thing. Time carries on and so must we. Memories, especially those covered in insoluble grease, must eventually be released. I suppose the sadness comes from the sense that not just an old appliance but also a charmed, irredeemable part of family life, our children now grown, has gone with it.

On the other hand, technology tends to improve over time. We learn from our missteps and gratuitous flourishes. I only ever used that light on the back of the stove, the one that illuminated the words American Crown, to impress friends. And, frankly, they didn’t seem all that impressed.

Ralph Gardner, Jr. is a journalist who divides his time between New York City and Columbia County. More of his work can be found at ralphgardner.com

The views expressed by commentators are solely those of the authors. They do not necessarily reflect the views of this station or its management.

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