I assume some people had central a/cs 30 years ago but not our family! Both of us never had central air conditioner; Instead, all of us had 1 window a/c set up in the kitchen.
It would only be turned on if it was close to a hundred degrees outside and, if it was still legitimately warm at night, all of us would all get our sleeping bags plus all of us would sleep in the middle of the kitchen floor to stay cool, and the a/c was not powerful enough to cool all of the dining rooms.
It could only cool the kitchen plus maybe, sometimes the kitchen. In the summer time the a/c would stay on nonstop for weeks at a time. This would cause it to literally freeze up. The back of the a/c would be full of frost plus ice plus our Mom would go outside plus hose it off with the garden hose plus all of us would turn off the a/c for a few minutes. I have no proposal if that was normal or not but it was normal for our family. Both of us have the same window air conditioner component for a great 20 years. our mom was also careful about cooking in the summer time because he did not want to heat up the house. Both of us would eat a lot of salads plus sandwiches in the summertime. It wasn’t until I grew up, got married, plus got a home of our own that I got central air conditioner plus felt the joys of having cool, comfortable air whenever plus wherever I wanted in the house, but my central a/c never freezes up either plus I can use the oven separate from worry too.