Ceiling fan be used to reduce the stratification of warm air in a room by forcing it down to affect both occupants' sensations and thermostat readings, thereby improving climate control energy efficiency. Punkah-type ceiling fans date back to 500 BC, and are native to India. Unlike modern rotary fans, these punkah fans move air by moving to and fro, and were operated manually by cord. The first rotary ceiling fans appeared in the early 1860s and 1870s in the United States. At that time, they were not powered by any form of electric motor. Instead, a stream of running water was used,
The Word of a Gentleman his wife Nora are the focus of many chapters (and the book opens with a quotation from Oscar Wilde's "The Ballad of Reading Gaol"); these reflect Niesewand's detention by Desmond Lardner-Burke under P. K. van der Byl and Smith, and his subsequent deportation, leaving behind his wife of three years, Nonie Niesewand (née Fogarty). The Word of a Gentleman The Word of a Gentleman (1981) (later retitled "Undercut") was the third of five novels written by Peter Niesewand, the South African journalist who spent 73 days in solitary confinement for his coverage of Ian Smith's government in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe).