Inventions and their inventors 1750-1920 (eBook)

Dave Rogers (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2011
198 Seiten
M-Y Books (Verlag)
978-1-906986-58-2 (ISBN)

Infos

Our everyday lives are continually influenced by inventors whose ideas have led to commercial products available in most high streets across the civilised world. For the most part these creative individuals have remained relatively unknown. Yet some of the companies set up by the successful inventors survive to this day albeit with company names no longer associated with the original idea.
Volume 1 of this two volume set documents some of the key inventions from the 'Spinning Jenny' invented by Hargraves in the late eighteenth century, to some of the most commercially successful ideas of the early 20th century.

Textauszug

1 Communications

1.1 Computers

 

Calculating Machine

Patent title:

Calculating Machine

Patent number:

US 388,116, patented 21st August 1888

Inventor(s):

S. Burroughs, of St. Louis, Missouri, assignor, by direct and mesne assignments, to the American Arithmometer company, of same place.

Biography:

William Seward Burroughs, born 28th January 1855, Auburn, New York, U.S. died 15th September 1898, Citronelle, Alabama. Burroughs received the John Scott Medal of the Franklin Institute as an award for his invention a year before his death. Although his machine was a commercial success, Burroughs died before receiving much money from it.

Patent abstract:

Be it known that I, WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS, a citizen of the United States, residing at St. Louis, in the State of Missouri, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Mechanical Accountants, of which the following is a specification.

My invention relates to that class of apparatus used for mechanically assisting arithmetical calculations; and my invention consists in the combination, with one or more registers, of a series of independent keys and intervening connections constructed, arranged, and operating, as fully specified hereinafter, so as to indicate upon the register the sum of any series of numbers by the proper manipulation of the keys, and also so as to print or permanently record the final result.

 

Calculating Machine

Patent title:

Calculating Machine

Patent number:

US 7,074, patented 5th February 1850

Inventor(s):

D. Parmelee of New Platz, New York

Biography:

Dubois D. Parmelee was born in 1830 in Redding Conn. died 18th April 1897. Qualified as both a chemist and medic, Parmelee worked in the rubber industry in Salem Mass. until the Goodyear inventions ran out and rubber prices dropped. He was one of the most active members of the American Institute and was the consulting chemist of the New York Belting and Packing Company.

Patent abstract:

The key No. 1 is of such length that when pressed down to its stop it will cause the lever (E) to traverse through a space sufficient to raise the rod B by the action of the pawl one notch and showing on the side the indication "1." The key No. 2, is of such length that when depressed to its stop it will cause the lever to traverse twice as far as will the key No. 1, and consequently will raise the rod twice as much, or two notches, and the other keys are proportioned in the same manner, No. 9 then is capable of being depressed nine times as far as No. 1, and will therefore raise the rod or indicator nine notches.

 

Mechanical Tabulating Machine

Patent title:

Art of compiling statistics

Patent number:

US 395,781, patented 8th January 1889

Inventor(s):

Herman Hollerith of New York, N. Y.

Biography:

Herman Hollerith, born 29th February 1860, Buffalo, New York, died 17th November 1929, Washington, D.C. Whilst his invention was a success in the United States, it drew much more attention in Europe and was widely adopted for a number of statistical purposes. Hollerith organised the Tabulating Machine Company (in 1896), which, through subsequent mergers, grew into the International Business Machines Corporation (IBM).

Patent abstract:

In the first place I have substituted for the continuous web or strip of my prior application a separate strip, card, or tablet, A, upon or within which the index-points are forged, as by punching holes in said card, and instead of using a separate templet or die for locating the several index-points I prefer to stamp or impress upon the cards, as by printing, the places or relative positions in which the index-point for each item is to be located. The card is, for convenience only, divided by lines into spaces, each space being numbered, lettered, or otherwise designated by marks or printed matter to indicate the place where a hole is to be punched in recording the several items pertaining to the individual. In this way each card when properly punched becomes a permanent record of the individual (whose name and number in the books or other matters can, if desired, be written on the face or back of the card) and can be filed away as such, or the several records so formed can be classified and distributed, as hereinafter described. Moreover; the record-card thus formed can be prepared at any time or place and by unskilled operatives, as each record is complete in itself and bears no special relation to any other record except in so far as the relative locations and positions of the corresponding marks are concerned, it being necessary that the corresponding index-points of all cards should occupy the same relative positions to all the others, which condition is insured by printing all the cards belonging to the series from the same or duplicate plates.

 

1.2 Printing and photography

 

Camera

Patent title:

Camera

Patent number:

US 388,850, patented 4th September 1888

Inventor(s):

George Eastman, of Rochester, New York

Biography:

George Eastman, born 12th July 1854, Waterville, New York, died 14th March 1932, Rochester, New York In 1892 he reorganised his business as the Eastman Kodak Company. Eastman gave away half his fortune in 1924. His gifts, which totaled more than $75,000,000, went to such beneficiaries as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Rochester.

Patent abstract:

This invention relates more particularly to improvements in that class of photographic apparatus known as "detective cameras;" and said invention consists in the novel and improved form, construction, and arrangement of parts constituting the case or body, the lens-support and shutter, and the film-holder, together with the various combinations of such instrumentalities as are hereinafter described, and set forth in the claims.

In the accompanying drawings, wherein I have illustrated one embodiment of my present improvements, Figure 1 is a view in perspective of the complete instrument.

 

Kinematoscope

Patent title:

Exhibiting stereoscopic pictures of moving objects

Patent number:

US 31,357, patented 5th February 1861

Inventor(s):

Coleman Sellers, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, assignor to himself and G. Burnham of same place

Biography:

Coleman Sellers was in born 1827 died 1902. Known briefly, as the Motoscope, Sellers posed his children working in his factory in Philadelphia for the original photographs for the Kinematoscope which were stereoscopically produced in a double-lensed camera. He was appointed Professor of Mechanics at the Franklin Institute (1881) and was non-resident Professor of Engineering at the Stevens Institute of Technology (1888). Sellers was awarded the order of St. Olaf by the King of Sweden (1877) and many other degrees and honours. He was a member and correspondent of the British Journal of Photography (1861-1863).

Patent abstract:

What I aim to accomplish is as I have above stated, to so exhibit stereoscopic pictures as to make them represent objects in motion such as the revolving wheels of machinery, and various motions of the human body, adding to the wonders of that marvellous invention “the stereoscope” a semblance of life that can only come from motion. It is to breathe into the statue like forms of the stereograph as it were, the breath of life. It may have occurred to many the possibility of effecting this desirable result, and the “phantasmascope” gives a clue to the manner of accomplishment of it. That is, that it must be done by viewing in succession a series of pictures (taken in different positions of the moving object) with sufficient rapidity to insure the image of one being retained on the retina until the next one is brought into view.

 

Linotype

Patent title:

Machine for producing printing bars

Patent number:

US 317,828, patented 12th May 1885

Inventor(s):

Ottmar Mergenthaler, of...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 3.3.2011
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur
• Themenwelt: Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Natur / Technik ► Weltraum / Astronomie
• Themenwelt: Kinder- / Jugendbuch
• Themenwelt: Schulbuch / Wörterbuch ► Lexikon / Chroniken
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Physik / Astronomie
• Themenwelt: Technik
• ISBN-10: 1-906986-58-4 / 1906986584
• ISBN-13: 978-1-906986-58-2 / 9781906986582