Editing Benjamin Lee Whorf (section)

=== Career in fire prevention ===
In 1918, Whorf graduated from the [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology]], where his academic performance was of average quality{{Cn|date=March 2024}}, with a degree in [[chemical engineering]]. In 1920, he married Celia Inez Peckham; they had three children, Raymond Ben, Robert Peckham and Celia Lee.<ref name="carroll6" /> Around the same time he began work as a fire prevention engineer (an inspector) for the [[The Hartford|Hartford Fire Insurance Company]]. He was particularly good at the job and was highly commended by his employers. His job required him to travel to production facilities throughout New England to be inspected. One anecdote describes him arriving at a chemical plant and being denied access by the director, who would not allow anyone to see the production procedure, which was a trade secret. Having been told what the plant produced, Whorf wrote a chemical formula on a piece of paper, saying to the director: "I think this is what you're doing". The surprised director asked Whorf how he knew about the secret procedure, and he simply answered: "You couldn't do it in any other way."<ref>{{harvcoltxt|Carroll|1956|p=4}}</ref>

Whorf helped to attract new customers to the Fire Insurance Company; they favored his thorough inspections and recommendations. Another famous anecdote from his job was used by Whorf to argue that language use affects habitual behavior.<ref name="Pullum 1991">{{harvcoltxt|Pullum|1991}}</ref> Whorf described a workplace in which full gasoline drums were stored in one room and empty ones in another; he said that because of flammable vapor the "empty" drums were more dangerous than those that were full, although workers handled them less carefully to the point that they smoked in the room with "empty" drums, but not in the room with full ones. Whorf argued that by habitually speaking of the vapor-filled drums as empty and by extension as inert, the workers were oblivious to the risk posed by smoking near the "empty drums".<ref name="HABITUAL" group="w"/>