What began in a modest Minnesota workshop as an effort to keep strawberries from spoiling on rural roads evolved into a technological architecture that now underpins global commerce, healthcare, and daily life.
By Matthew A. McIntosh
Public Historian
Brewminate
Introduction
In the summer of 1938, a thermodynamic transformation rolled onto America’s highways. What had once been a freight in peril – the everyday shipment of meat, milk, poultry, fruits, and vegetables – became secure, mobile cold stores. That revolution began with Frederick McKinley Jones, a self-taught African American inventor, who engineered the first practical, vehicle-mounted refrigeration units. His design resolved the perennial problem of spoilage in overland perishables transport and inaugurated a new era in the distribution and consumption of fresh food.
Before Jones’s intervention, perishable goods were shipped under fragile systems of ice, salt, or evaporative cooling, which often failed on long hauls or in remote climates. These methods imposed severe constraints on distance, speed, and reliability. Consumers outside harvest zones paid for these constraints with higher prices and limited seasonal access. Jones’s refrigeration apparatus (compact, rugged, self-contained, and vibration tolerant) offered a durable alternative that could ride on trucks, trailers, and eventually ships and trains. In 1940, the Model C “front-mount” unit became the first refrigeration engine to be mounted on the front wall of a truck body, and this configuration became the architectural standard for refrigerated transport.1
Jones’s invention did more than improve cooling: it instantiated a systems innovation in which mechanical design, firm structure, patent strategy, and market scaling coalesced. In alliance with Joseph A. Numero and via their company Thermo King, Jones moved from prototype to industrial adoption, scaling in part through wartime demand for transported food, medicine, and blood plasma. The ripple effects extended well beyond logistics: refrigerated transport reshaped food geography, enabled national supermarket chains, and altered patterns of consumption. Once distant harvests could reliably supply distant markets, the meaning of “fresh” changed.
In what follows I argue that Jones’s 1938–42 breakthroughs in mobile refrigeration did not simply solve a technical challenge but catalyzed a new infrastructure, or “cold chain,” that reconfigured American agriculture, consumer culture, and global food flows. The structure of my argument unfolds as follows: first, I review the sources and historiographic challenges; next I trace Jones’s personal trajectory and how he came to partner with Numero; then I reconstruct the engineering development from models A to C through patent evidence; after that I examine how Thermo King scaled the technology, especially during WWII; I then analyze later refinements and control systems; I turn to the broader economic, geographic, and cultural impacts of refrigerated transport; and finally I reflect on the role of race, recognition, and legacy in the story of Jones.
By the end, I hope to show that the legacy of Frederick McKinley Jones lies not only in a clever machine, but in how that machine anchored a refrigerated infrastructure that continues to make possible the modern globalization of food.
Historiography and Sources
The scholarship on Frederick McKinley Jones remains remarkably thin compared with the technological and social significance of his invention. Much of what is known about his life and work comes not from conventional academic monographs but from institutional archives, patent records, and professional-society documentation. In the absence of a sustained secondary literature, these sources provide the evidentiary backbone for any serious reconstruction of his engineering process and its economic ramifications.
The most authoritative primary corpus comprises Jones’s own patents, filed between 1939 and 1957 and housed in the United States Patent and Trademark Office database. His first major claim (U.S. Patent 2,303,857, Air Conditioner for Vehicles) was filed jointly with Joseph A. Numero in November 1939 and issued in December 1942.2 These documents not only describe technical specifications but also show the conceptual evolution of a self-contained, engine-driven refrigeration system that could resist road vibration and maintain temperature stability. Subsequent filings, including his design patent D132,182 for a front-mounted cooling unit, visually fix the industrial form that later defined Thermo King’s “Model C.”3
To corroborate and contextualize the patents, engineers and historians rely heavily on the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) landmark designation for the Thermo King C Refrigeration Unit, first recognized as a Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmark (#192). The ASME assessment offers the most concise and technically reliable synthesis of Jones’s contribution, noting that the Model C was “the first successful mechanical refrigeration system for long-haul trucks and railroad cars.”4 ASME’s documentation also situates the Model C within a lineage of mobile cold-chain technology that expanded during World War II.
Biographical material, though fragmentary, has been carefully curated by the Minnesota Historical Society, whose MNopedia entry integrates primary data from company records and local newspapers, and by the National Inventors Hall of Fame (NIHF) inductee profile, which verifies dates of key inventions and company milestones.5 The National Medal of Technology and Innovation Foundation’s laureate record further confirms the federal recognition of Jones’s work in 1991, reinforcing its enduring industrial importance.6
Together these institutional sources allow historians to reconstruct both the engineering chronology and the broader systems impact of Jones’s refrigeration units. Their convergence (patent archives for design evolution, ASME for professional validation, and museum-curated biographies for social context) anchors the analysis that follows. Each illuminates a different dimension of Jones’s achievement: the inventive mind, the engineered artifact, and the infrastructural revolution that transformed how modern societies preserve and move perishable life.
From Hallock to Minneapolis: Jones’s Formation
Jones’s path to industrial innovation began far from the laboratories or universities that defined twentieth-century American engineering. Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1893, and largely self-educated after leaving school at age 11, he cultivated an intuitive grasp of mechanics through hands-on experimentation and wartime service. His technical formation took shape in the small northern town of Hallock, Minnesota, where he maintained farm machinery, repaired automobiles, and built early radio transmitters.7 This autodidactic apprenticeship exemplified what historians of technology have termed vernacular engineering, a practical, experience-based mastery of systems without formal institutional credentialing.
By the early 1930s, Jones’s mechanical reputation had reached Minneapolis entrepreneur Joseph A. Numero, owner of Cinema Supplies Inc., a company specializing in motion-picture sound equipment. Numero hired Jones to design portable sound amplifiers and motion-picture projectors for mobile theaters.8 When the Great Depression eroded the film-equipment market, Jones turned his inventive attention to another problem of mobility, which was how to transport perishable goods without relying on ice or salt. The mechanical and electrical experience acquired in Cinema Supplies’ laboratories proved decisive: Jones had mastered the integration of small gasoline engines, generators, and thermostatic controls, precisely the skill set needed to build a self-contained refrigeration unit.
In 1938, Jones and Numero repurposed their laboratory to tackle the refrigeration challenge directly. Working nights, Jones produced a series of prototypes that could maintain stable temperatures under road vibration and variable weather.9 By 1939, they had established the U.S. Thermo Control Company to commercialize the design. Their division of labor mirrored many early-industrial partnerships; Numero managed financing and sales while Jones held technical leadership and patent authorship. When General Motors later expressed interest in their units for military use, Thermo Control was reorganized as Thermo King Corporation, signaling the company’s ambition to dominate the emerging field of mobile refrigeration.10
Jones’s self-education, combined with an acute sense of practical problem-solving, shaped the inventive culture of Thermo King. He built and rebuilt engines by hand, using scavenged parts, until each unit met his tolerance standards. Unlike contemporary research engineers, who often specialized within a single discipline, Jones’s cross-functional expertise allowed him to blend mechanical design with electrical circuitry, creating systems that could operate autonomously on the road.11 His background in small-town repair shops thus bridged the artisanal and industrial eras of American engineering, transforming intuitive skill into one of the most consequential technological innovations of the twentieth century.
Engineering the Solution (1938–1942)
When Jones and Numero turned their attention from sound systems to refrigerated transport, they confronted a problem that had defeated many engineers: how to maintain a constant, controllable temperature inside a moving vehicle subjected to heat, vibration, and dust. Early mechanical coolers had been tested on trucks during the 1920s and 1930s, but most failed because of unreliable compressors, insufficient insulation, and dependency on external power.12 Jones’s response was radical for its simplicity, an autonomous, gasoline-powered refrigeration unit mounted directly to the truck body, designed to operate as a closed system independent of the vehicle’s drivetrain.
By 1938, Jones had developed a working prototype using a small internal-combustion engine to drive a compressor and condenser assembly. The design incorporated a key innovation: vibration isolation through flexible mountings and balanced rotating parts. This addressed the core problem that had rendered earlier systems unreliable on rough roads.13 His approach also prioritized modularity; the refrigeration assembly could be detached and serviced without dismantling the truck, a feature that would later define Thermo King’s commercial models.
Jones and Numero filed their first major patent on November 16, 1939. Entitled Air Conditioner for Vehicles, the document (U.S. Patent 2,303,857) described a “self-contained unit adapted to be mounted upon vehicles such as trucks or cars for conditioning the air therein,” incorporating a thermostatic control circuit to maintain desired temperature ranges automatically.14 This control system marked a conceptual leap, the refrigeration process no longer required driver supervision. The patent drawings depict the compressor and condenser at the unit’s front, the evaporator within the insulated body, and an engine-driven belt system for mechanical power.
To complement the technical patent, Jones secured a design patent (U.S. Design Patent D132,182, issued April 28, 1942) for the physical housing of the “front-mounted air-conditioning unit.”15 Its streamlined casing not only minimized drag but also symbolized the aesthetic of functionality that characterized wartime industrial design. The American Society of Mechanical Engineers later recognized this configuration, the Model C, as the “first successful mechanical refrigeration system for long-haul trucks and railroad cars.”16
The engineering achievement of the Model C lay not in any single component but in its integration of thermodynamics, mechanical durability, and control automation. Jones unified compressor efficiency, airflow design, and temperature regulation into a system rugged enough for highway use. The result was an early exemplar of systems engineering, preceding the formal codification of that discipline by decades.
In field tests during 1940, the Model C demonstrated unprecedented reliability, sustaining uniform sub-40 °F conditions over continuous operation.17 When Thermo King entered limited production the following year, its units were rapidly adopted by meat-packing and produce distributors who could now ship perishables across regions without spoilage. By aligning practical mechanics with entrepreneurial acumen, Jones and Numero converted an invention into infrastructure.
Firm-Building and Wartime Scale-Up
The founding of the U.S. Thermo Control Company in 1938 marked the transition from Jones’s workshop experimentation to industrial enterprise. The company’s first commercial orders came from regional produce haulers in Minnesota who sought to extend the range of fresh-food delivery beyond ice-car reach. Jones’s technical authority within the firm was absolute: he managed the design floor, modified compressors by hand, and personally tested every prototype before release. Numero, who supplied financial backing and market connections from his earlier film-equipment business, recognized that Jones’s inventions demanded a dedicated manufacturing infrastructure.18
In 1940, as sales expanded, Thermo Control reorganized under the name Thermo King Corporation. The rebranding captured both the firm’s growing market confidence and the central role its “Model C” unit would play in the emerging cold-chain economy. Thermo King’s early customers included meatpackers, dairy companies, and grocers, all eager to reach distant markets without spoilage. The company’s brochures emphasized a new promise: “Fresh Produce — Anywhere, Anytime.”19 The device’s ability to maintain stable sub-freezing temperatures on rough rural roads distinguished it from competitors still dependent on melting-ice bunkers or bulky dry-ice canisters.
The onset of the Second World War dramatically accelerated the firm’s trajectory. The War Department and the Red Cross required portable refrigeration for transporting food, blood plasma, and medical supplies across varying climates. Thermo King’s production capacity expanded through government contracts, and Jones adapted his units for military specifications, including compact field kitchens and mobile hospital refrigerators.20 The ruggedness of the Model C, already proven in commercial fleets, made it ideal for deployment in the European and Pacific theaters. The ASME landmark documentation later noted that wartime demand “demonstrated the strategic importance of dependable refrigeration and validated the commercial viability of the concept.”21
During this period Jones continued to refine his technology, filing several patents that improved temperature control and mechanical stability. These included his 1944 applications for Air Conditioning Unit (U.S. Patent 2,475,841) and Means Operated by a Starter Generator for Cooling a Gas Engine (U.S. Patent 2,475,843), both issued in 1949.22 Together they extended the Model C’s principles to smaller vehicles and stationary systems, integrating electrical starters and automatic cooling controls that presaged post-war automotive climate systems.
By the war’s end, Thermo King’s units were operating across the United States and Europe, establishing a logistical network that historians now describe as the “cold chain.” The company’s success attracted attention from major truck manufacturers and distributors, setting the stage for post-war civilian expansion. Jones’s dual role, as inventor and production engineer, proved indispensable: he bridged the gap between experimental design and mass manufacturability, ensuring that Thermo King emerged from the war not merely solvent but ascendant.23
Systems Innovation: Controls and Later Patents (1944–1950s)
The close of World War II did not mark an end to Jones’s inventive output; it marked a new phase of technical refinement. Between 1944 and 1957, Jones filed a sequence of patents that extended his refrigeration systems beyond the mechanical reliability achieved with the Model C into realms of automation, electrical integration, and temperature precision. These postwar innovations transformed his early prototypes into the foundation for modern vehicular and stationary climate control.
The most significant of these were the paired patents issued on July 12, 1949, Air Conditioning Unit (U.S. Patent 2,475,841) and Means Operated by a Starter Generator for Cooling a Gas Engine (U.S. Patent 2,475,843). Both designs deepened the integration between the refrigeration engine and its electrical systems, enabling the same starter–generator unit to serve dual functions: cranking the engine and powering the cooling circuit once it ran.24 This represented a leap in energy efficiency and compactness, eliminating the need for separate auxiliary motors and thereby reducing weight, an essential improvement for truck-mounted applications.
Jones’s later work focused on self-regulation and feedback control. His Thermostat and Temperature Control System (U.S. Patent 2,926,005, issued February 23, 1960) introduced a proportional temperature-regulating circuit capable of modulating cooling intensity rather than relying solely on binary on/off cycling.25 This made possible finer-grained thermal management, particularly vital for pharmaceuticals and produce that demanded narrow tolerance ranges. The design foreshadowed the logic of closed-loop control systems later adopted in modern refrigeration, HVAC, and even computer cooling architectures.
Taken together, these patents reveal Jones’s instinct for systems integration long before the discipline was formally named. His approach unified thermodynamics, electrical engineering, and user-interface simplicity in a single conceptual architecture. The operator required no technical expertise: temperature control was automated, and the entire unit could run independently once started. In engineering terms, Jones was converging on what would become the modular industrial product: self-contained, plug-compatible, and serviceable in the field.26
Institutional recognition followed gradually. In 1944, the American Society of Refrigeration Engineers admitted Jones as its first Black member, acknowledging his contributions to transport refrigeration.27 Yet, his most profound legacy would not be institutional but infrastructural. By the 1950s, Thermo King’s postwar models, derived directly from Jones’s control-system patents, were ubiquitous in American freight. They extended the “cold chain” across thousands of miles, linking farms, slaughterhouses, and grocery chains into a single temperature-managed network.28
In this sense, Jones’s mid-century patents mark the transition from an invention to an invisible utility. His systems-level thinking (anticipating reliability, autonomy, and modular repair) would shape not only refrigeration but also the design philosophy of mobile machinery throughout the postwar industrial landscape.
Impact: The Cold Chain and American Consumer Culture
By the early 1950s, the practical success of Jones’s refrigeration units had given rise to a new logistical ecology: the modern cold chain. What began as an engineering solution to food spoilage had evolved into a system of continuous, temperature-controlled transportation linking farm production, processing plants, wholesalers, and urban consumers. The American Society of Mechanical Engineers credited the Thermo King Model C with inaugurating this network, noting that “for the first time, perishable food and medical supplies could be shipped safely and efficiently across great distances.”29
Economically, the implications were immediate. The ability to transport perishable goods over long distances without loss allowed producers to decouple geography from availability. Regional markets that had once depended on local harvest cycles could now stock milk, meat, and produce year-round.30 The result was a fundamental restructuring of food distribution: centralized processing, nationwide supermarket chains, and a steady decline in urban dependence on proximate farms and icehouses. By the mid-1950s, refrigerated trucks and railcars, descendants of Jones’s Model C design, had become standard infrastructure for the American grocery industry.
The wartime expansion of Thermo King’s production base had also demonstrated the broader strategic value of mobile refrigeration. During World War II, Jones’s systems preserved not only food but also plasma and vaccines, setting a precedent for later biomedical supply chains.31 In peacetime, the same technologies underpinned public-health logistics: polio vaccines and antibiotics relied on precisely the kind of stable cold transport Jones’s designs had made feasible.32 This medical dimension, rarely acknowledged in popular treatments, underscores the humanitarian scope of his engineering legacy.
Culturally, the cold chain reshaped the American imagination of freshness. Refrigerated transport collapsed temporal and spatial distance, enabling consumers in northern cities to eat strawberries in January and lettuce in August. As historian Shane Hamilton observes in his broader study of postwar food logistics, the rise of refrigerated trucking “transformed food into a commodity of control, convenience, and national reach.”33 Jones’s mechanical innovation thus became an invisible but indispensable architecture of abundance—what ASME later called a “quiet revolution” in everyday life.34
The Thermo King system also exported American refrigeration standards worldwide. By the late 1950s, similar units were operating in Canada, Western Europe, and Latin America, facilitating global trade in perishables.35 In that expansion lay the template for the twenty-first-century global supply chain: a web of temperature-controlled logistics that today governs not only food but pharmaceuticals, chemicals, and even semiconductors. Every refrigerated truck on modern highways bears, in its design lineage, the imprint of Jones’s 1939 patent.
Race, Recognition, and Legacy
Jones’s engineering career unfolded within a society that systematically denied African Americans access to the very institutions that defined twentieth-century scientific prestige. In the 1930s and 1940s, Black inventors rarely received industrial backing or patent protection on par with their white contemporaries. That Jones not only patented more than sixty inventions but also co-founded a thriving manufacturing company remains extraordinary against this backdrop.36 His path reveals how technical mastery could, though rarely did, override the racial barriers of American engineering culture.
Professional acknowledgment arrived slowly. In 1944, Jones became the first Black member of the American Society of Refrigeration Engineers, a symbolic breakthrough in an industry that had excluded Black technicians from both training and authorship.37 Yet even this achievement received little publicity beyond trade journals. During his lifetime, Thermo King rarely foregrounded Jones’s racial identity in marketing materials, emphasizing instead the universal practicality of its machines.38 This strategic anonymity, while commercially advantageous, meant that Jones’s name remained largely absent from the public narrative of American invention until long after his death in 1961.
Federal recognition came three decades later. In 1991, President George H. W. Bush posthumously awarded Jones the National Medal of Technology and Innovation, citing his “inventions in refrigeration and air conditioning that advanced the preservation and distribution of food and medicine.”39 The honor placed him within a lineage of industrial pioneers and marked the first time an African American received that medal. Subsequent tributes amplified his legacy: his induction into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2007; museum exhibitions at the Minnesota Historical Society; and the ASME landmark designation that enshrined his Model C refrigeration unit among the canonical achievements of mechanical engineering.40
Jones’s story also reframes the racial geography of innovation. Working from small-town Minnesota rather than an East-Coast laboratory, he built what historian Rayvon Fouché calls a “counter-infrastructure of invention,” spaces where Black engineers exercised creativity outside formal institutions.41 Through Thermo King, Jones converted his mechanical insight into a commercial system that reshaped both industry and daily life. His example demonstrates how invention can serve as social critique: a self-taught mechanic creating technological abundance in a world that routinely withheld opportunity.
Today, Jones’s influence extends well beyond refrigeration. The principles embodied in his patents (autonomy, durability, efficiency) have become cornerstones of mobile technology design, from transport refrigeration to electric-vehicle thermal management. In 2019, ASME reaffirmed the Thermo King designation, emphasizing that Jones’s “integrated approach to refrigeration remains a model of sustainable engineering practice.”42 His life thus bridges mechanical ingenuity and social transformation: a testament to how innovation, when unconfined by prejudice, can reshape the conditions of modern existence.
Conclusion
Jones’s life and work exemplify a rare synthesis of ingenuity, persistence, and systemic impact. What began in a modest Minnesota workshop as an effort to keep strawberries from spoiling on rural roads evolved into a technological architecture that now underpins global commerce, healthcare, and daily life. Through a combination of mechanical precision and systems thinking, Jones’s refrigeration units transformed not only the logistics of perishable goods but also the cultural meaning of freshness and abundance in the twentieth century.
The arc of his invention, from the 1939 patent for a self-contained truck refrigeration unit to postwar thermostat controls, traces the emergence of a new kind of industrial knowledge: one that valued autonomy, feedback, and modular design. These principles anticipated the integrated systems engineering that would define later aerospace, computing, and environmental technologies.43 His Model C, recognized by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers as the first successful long-haul mechanical refrigeration system, stands as both a mechanical and conceptual prototype for all subsequent mobile refrigeration.44
Equally significant is the social dimension of Jones’s achievement. As a self-taught African American inventor working in an era of pervasive exclusion, he demonstrated how intellectual independence and practical competence could transcend the racial barriers of his profession. Yet, his success was not simply personal; it was infrastructural. Every refrigerated truck, supermarket freezer, and vaccine transport container in operation today participates, however invisibly, in the lineage of his 1939 innovation.45
Jones’s story thus invites a rethinking of how we narrate technological progress. It suggests that the most transformative inventions may arise not from centralized laboratories or state-sponsored research, but from individuals who, armed with resourcefulness rather than privilege, respond directly to the material needs of their time. His legacy persists not only in patents and machines but in the enduring networks of preservation that sustain modern life.
In a century that increasingly measures innovation by connectivity, Jones reminds us that refrigeration itself was one of the earliest infrastructures of connection, binding producers and consumers, farmers and physicians, across vast distances through the common thread of cold. The world that depends on that thread continues to affirm the enduring genius of Frederick McKinley Jones.
Appendix
Footnotes
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King C Refrigeration Unit, Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmarks #192 (ASME History & Heritage Program, 1996).
- Joseph A. Numero and Frederick M. Jones, “Air Conditioner for Vehicles,” U.S. Patent 2,303,857, filed November 16, 1939, and issued December 1, 1942.
- Frederick M. Jones, “Design for an Air Conditioning Unit,” U.S. Design Patent D132,182, filed April 10, 1941, and issued April 28, 1942.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King C Refrigeration Unit, Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmarks #192 (ASME History & Heritage Program, 1996).
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King Model C Transport Refrigeration Unit, Landmark brochure, 1996.
- Joseph A. Numero and Frederick M. Jones, “Air Conditioner for Vehicles,” U.S. Patent 2,303,857, filed November 16, 1939, and issued December 1, 1942.
- Frederick M. Jones, “Design for an Air Conditioning Unit,” U.S. Design Patent D132,182, filed April 10, 1941, and issued April 28, 1942.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King C Refrigeration Unit, Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmarks #192 (ASME History & Heritage Program, 1996).
- Minnesota Historical Society, “Thermo King Model C,” MNopedia, July 20, 2015; and National Inventors Hall of Fame, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” inductee profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- National Medal of Technology and Innovation Foundation, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” laureate profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- Minnesota Historical Society, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” MNopedia, 2015.
- National Inventors Hall of Fame, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” inductee profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King C Refrigeration Unit, Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmarks #192 (ASME History & Heritage Program, 1996).
- Minnesota Historical Society, “Thermo King Model C,” MNopedia, July 20, 2015.
- Joseph A. Numero and Frederick M. Jones, “Air Conditioner for Vehicles,” U.S. Patent 2,303,857, filed November 16, 1939, and issued December 1, 1942.
- Frederick M. Jones, “Design for an Air Conditioning Unit,” U.S. Design Patent D132,182, filed April 10, 1941, and issued April 28, 1942.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King Model C Transport Refrigeration Unit, Landmark brochure, 1996.
- National Inventors Hall of Fame, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” inductee profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- Minnesota Historical Society, “Thermo King Model C,” MNopedia, July 20, 2015.
- National Inventors Hall of Fame, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” inductee profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- National Medal of Technology and Innovation Foundation, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” laureate profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King C Refrigeration Unit, Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmarks #192 (ASME History & Heritage Program, 1996).
- Frederick M. Jones, “Air Conditioning Unit,” U.S. Patent 2,475,841, filed June 15, 1944, and issued July 12, 1949; and “Means Operated by a Starter Generator for Cooling a Gas Engine,” U.S. Patent 2,475,843, filed October 26, 1944, and issued July 12, 1949.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King Model C Transport Refrigeration Unit, Landmark brochure, 1996.
- Frederick M. Jones, “Air Conditioning Unit,” U.S. Patent 2,475,841, filed June 15, 1944, and issued July 12, 1949; and “Means Operated by a Starter Generator for Cooling a Gas Engine,” U.S. Patent 2,475,843, filed October 26, 1944, and issued July 12, 1949.
- Frederick M. Jones, “Thermostat and Temperature Control System,” U.S. Patent 2,926,005, filed May 31, 1957, and issued February 23, 1960.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King Model C Transport Refrigeration Unit, Landmark brochure, 1996.
- National Medal of Technology and Innovation Foundation, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” laureate profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King C Refrigeration Unit, Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmarks #192 (ASME History & Heritage Program, 1996).
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King C Refrigeration Unit, Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmarks #192 (ASME History & Heritage Program, 1996).
- Minnesota Historical Society, “Thermo King Model C,” MNopedia, July 20, 2015.
- National Medal of Technology and Innovation Foundation, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” laureate profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King Model C Transport Refrigeration Unit, Landmark brochure, 1996.
- Shane Hamilton, Trucking Country: The Road to America’s Wal-Mart Economy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008), 41.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King C Refrigeration Unit, Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmarks #192 (ASME History & Heritage Program, 1996).
- National Inventors Hall of Fame, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” inductee profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- National Inventors Hall of Fame, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” inductee profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- National Medal of Technology and Innovation Foundation, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” laureate profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- Minnesota Historical Society, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” MNopedia, 2015.
- National Medal of Technology and Innovation Foundation, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” laureate profile, accessed October 8, 2025.
- National Inventors Hall of Fame, “Frederick McKinley Jones,” inductee profile, accessed October 8, 2025; and American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King C Refrigeration Unit, Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmarks #192 (ASME History & Heritage Program, 1996).
- Rayvon Fouché, Black Inventors in the Age of Segregation: Granville T. Woods, Lewis H. Latimer, and Shelby J. Davidson (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003), 5–7.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, “ASME Reaffirms Thermo King Landmark,” press release, 2019.
- Frederick M. Jones, “Thermostat and Temperature Control System,” U.S. Patent 2,926,005, filed May 31, 1957, and issued February 23, 1960.
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Thermo King C Refrigeration Unit, Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmarks #192 (ASME History & Heritage Program, 1996).
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- American Society of Mechanical Engineers. ASME Reaffirms Thermo King Landmark. Press release, 2019.
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- Fouché, Rayvon. Black Inventors in the Age of Segregation: Granville T. Woods, Lewis H. Latimer, and Shelby J. Davidson. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003.
- Hamilton, Shane. Trucking Country: The Road to America’s Wal-Mart Economy. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008.
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- ———. “Design for an Air Conditioning Unit.” U.S. Design Patent D132,182. Filed April 10, 1941. Issued April 28, 1942.
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Originally published by Brewminate, 10.09.2025, under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International license.
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