Most people don't think about death (or try not to), while others devote their full attention to it, to the point that they have developed devices to control the time and place. But at the beginning of the 20th century, there was a special interest in preserving the body after passing, keeping decomposition and natural deterioration at bay. One of the most radical ideas was to keep the body inside a giant crystal cube, a design that also allowed... displaying the deceased as if it were a statue.
From Ancient Egypt to the 20th Century
Almost inevitably, our first stop to better understand the preservation of the dead is Ancient Egypt. In most cases, bodies were buried in pits, and the combination of sand, heat, and lack of moisture led to natural mummification. The first examples of intentional mummification date back to before the First Dynasty, and over the centuries the development of rituals exploded, making preservation a critical step to live well "on the other side."
Needless to say, the idea of preserving bodies not only remained current, but was implemented after the death of several leaders (Lenin and Mao Zedong come to mind). However, at the beginning of the 20th century, different alternatives were explored on the other side of the pond. One of them was... encapsulating bodies using transparent crystal cubes.
The Patent for the Crystal Cube
The most solid piece of evidence we have is a patent from 1903 associated with Joseph Karwowski, a Russian inventor residing in New York. The patent suggests two versions: one large enough to cover the whole body, and a more compact one, focused on the head. In essence, the body was bathed in sodium silicate, and then covered with melted glass.
Sodium silicate is often used to preserve food (especially eggs) when refrigeration is not available, but even if a perfect airtight seal was achieved, there were still many doubts about the integrity of the body after exposure to silicate and heat.
Glass Coffins and the Inevitable Problem
Karwowski's design never materialized, although that didn't prevent the creation of traditional crystal coffins to preserve the body after burial. The American Glass Casket Company was one of the pioneers in the 1920s. Unfortunately, the exact number of coffins manufactured is unknown (it was even suspected that it was all a scam), but one of them remains intact in the National Museum of Funeral History in Houston.
The problem was obvious: designers of these airtight capsules (whether glass or metal) ignored the details of the decomposition process. In simple terms, corpses emit gases, and it's no exaggeration to think of explosions due to accumulated pressure. I think that's enough information for now.
