Grills (734)

A barbecue grill is a device for cooking food by applying heat directly from below. There are several varieties of such grills, with most falling into one of two categories: gas-fueled and charcoal. There is a great debate over the merits of charcoal or gas for use as the cooking method between barbecue grillers.

Barbecuing is a pervasive tradition in much of the world. Almost all competition grillers use charcoal, most often in large, custom designed brick or steel grills. They can range from a few 55 gallon oil drums sawed lengthwise on their sides to make a lid and grill base, to large, vehicle sized grills made of brick, weighing nearly a ton.

Historical Information

E.G. Kingsford was the prime force behind the development of the grill in the United States. Kingsford was a relative of Henry Ford who saw that Ford's Model T production lines were producing a large amount of wood scraps that were just being discarded. Kingsford suggested to Ford that a charcoal manufacturing facility be established next to the assembly line and sell the charcoal, with the Ford name, in Ford dealerships. After Kingsford's death, the company was renamed Kingsford Charcoal Co. in his honor.

George Stephen created the hemispherical grill design, jokingly called "Sputnik" by Stephen's neighbors. Stephen, a welder, worked for Weber Brothers Metal Works, a metal fabrication shop primarily concerned with welding steel spheres together to make buoys. Stephen was tired of wind blowing ash onto his food when he grilled so he took the lower half of a buoy, welded three steel legs onto it, and fabricated a shallower hemisphere for use as a lid. He took the results home and following some initial success started the Weber-Stephen Products Co.

The outdoor gas grill was invented in the 1960s in Little Rock, Arkansas by William G. Wepfer and Melton Lancaster while working for ARKLA, the Arkansas and Louisiana power company. Wepfer, a graduate of the U.S.Naval Academy, was Director of Marketing, charged with finding new ways to sell natural gas to ARKLA residential customers, and therefore bought a basic charcoal grill and re-designed it in the Wepfer's garage so that natural gas provided the fuel for the grill.