Fast facts about inventions and inventors

Fast facts about inventions and inventors


In 1894, Lord Kelvin predicted that radio had no future; he also predicted that heavier-than-air flying machines were impossible.


The word “sneaker” was coined by Henry McKinney, an advertising agent for N.W. Ayer & Son.






Charles Macintosh invented the waterproof coat, the Mackintosh, in 1823.






Air-filled tyres were used on bicycles before they were used on motorcars.






The paperclip was invented by Norwegian Johann Vaaler.





Music was sent down a telephone line for the first time in 1876, the year the phone was invented.













Joseph Niepce developed the world’s first photographic image in 1827.





The videophone was invented by Bell Laboratories in 1927.






The very first projection of an image on a screen was made by a German priest. In 1646, Athanasius Kircher used a candle or oil lamp to project hand-painted images onto a white screen. Modern projectors emit more than a thousand Lumens!





The first neon sign was made in 1923 for a Packard dealership.






The first vending machine was invented by Hero of Alexandria in the first century. When a coin was dropped into a slot, its weight would pull a cork out of a spigot and the machine would dispense a trickle of holy water.






The can opener was invented 48 years after cans were introduced.






The hair perm was invented in 1906 by Karl Ludwig Nessler of Germany.





Leonardo da Vinci never built the inventions he designed.






Traffic lights were used before the advent of the motorcar.






The Monopoly game was invented by Charles Darrow in 1933. He sold the rights to George Parker in 1935, then aged 58. Parker invented more than 100 games, including Pit, Rook, Flinch, Risk and Clue.






One hour before Alexander Graham Bell registered his patent for the telephone in 1876, Elisha Gray patented his design. After years of litigation, the patent went to Bell.






Thomas Edison filed 1,093 patents, including those for the light bulb, electric railways and the movie camera. When he died in 1931, he held 34 patents for the telephone, 141 for batteries, 150 for the telegraph and 389 patents for electric light and power.






The first fax process was patented in 1843.






Count Alessandro Volta invented the first battery in the 18th century.






During the 1860s, George Leclanche developed the dry-cell battery, the basis for modern batteries.






In 1894 Thomas Edison and W K L Dickson introduced the first film camera.






In 1895 French brothers Auguste and Louis Lumiere demonstrated a projector system in Paris. In 1907 they screened the first public movie.






The first electronic mail, or “email”, was sent in 1972 by Ray Tomlinson. It was also his idea to use the @ sign to separate the name of the user from the name of the computer.






Queen Elizabeth of Britain sent her first email in 1976.






In 1889, Kansas undertaker Almon B. Strowger wanted to prevent telephone operators from advising his rivals of the death of local citizens. So he invented the automatic exchange.

10 Discoveries by women.

10: Circular Saw






In the late 18th century, a religious sect known as the Shakers emerged. Shakers valued living communally (albeit celibately), equality between the sexes and hard work. Tabitha Babbitt lived in a Shaker community in Massachusetts and worked as a weaver, but in 1810, she came up with a way to lighten the load of her brethren. She observed men cutting wood with a pit saw, which is a two-handled saw that requires two men to pull it back and forth. Though the saw is pulled both ways, it only cuts wood when it's pulled forward; the return stroke is useless. To Babbitt, that was wasted energy, so she created a prototype of the circular saw that would go on to be used in saw mills. She attached a circular blade to her spinning wheel so that every movement of the saw produced results. Because of Shaker precepts, Babbitt didn't apply for a patent for the circular saw she created.


9: Chocolate Chip Cookies






There is no doubt that many treasured recipes came about through accidental invention in the kitchen, but we must single out one of the most enduring -- and delicious -- of these recipes: the chocolate chip cookie.


Ruth Wakefield had worked as a dietitian and food lecturer before buying an old toll house outside of Boston with her husband. Traditionally, toll houses were places weary travelers paid their road tolls, grabbed a quick bite and fed their horses. Wakefield and her husband converted the toll house into an inn with a restaurant. One day in 1930, Wakefield was baking up a batch of Butter Drop Do cookies for her guests. The recipe called for melted chocolate, but Wakefield had run out of baker's chocolate. She took a Nestle chocolate bar, crumbled it into pieces and threw it into her batter, expecting the chocolate pieces to melt during baking. Instead, the chocolate held its shape, and the chocolate chip cookie was born.


Nestle noticed that sales of its chocolate bars jumped in Mrs. Wakefield's corner of Massachusetts, so they met with her about the cookie, which was fast gaining a reputation among travelers. At Wakefield's suggestion, they began scoring their chocolate (cutting lines into the bar that allow for easier breaking) and then, in 1939, they began selling Nestle Toll House Real Semi-Sweet Chocolate Morsels. The Wakefield cookie recipe was printed on the back of the package; in exchange, Ruth Wakefield received free chocolate for life


8: Liquid Paper






Bette Nesmith Graham was not a very good typist. Still, the high school dropout worked her way through the secretarial pool to become the executive secretary for the chairman of the board of the Texas Bank and Trust. It was the 1950s, and the electric typewriter had just been introduced. Secretaries often found themselves retyping entire pages because of one tiny mistake, as the new model's carbon ribbon made it difficult to correct errors.


One day, Graham watched workers painting a holiday display on a bank window. She noticed that when they made mistakes, they simply added another layer of paint to cover them up, and she thought she could apply that idea to her typing blunders. Using her blender, Graham mixed up a water-based tempera paint with dye that matched her company's stationary. She took it to work and, using a fine watercolor brush, she was able to quickly correct her errors. Soon, the other secretaries were clamoring for the product, which Graham continued to produce in her kitchen. Graham was fired from her job for spending so much time distributing what she called "Mistake Out," but in her unemployment she was able to tweak her mixture, rename the product Liquid Paper and receive a patent in 1958. Even though typewriters have been replaced by computers in many offices, many people still have a bottle or two of that white correction fluid on hand.


7: The Compiler and COBOL Computer Language






When we think about advancements in computers, we tend to think about men like Charles Babbage, Alan Turing and Bill Gates. But Admiral Grace Murray Hopper deserves credit for her role in the computer industry. Admiral Hopper joined the military in 1943 and was stationed at Harvard University, where she worked on IBM's Harvard Mark I computer, the first large-scale computer in the United States. She was the third person to program this computer, and she wrote a manual of operations that lit the path for those that followed her. In the 1950s, Admiral Hopper invented the compiler, which translates English commands into computer code. This device meant that programmers could create code more easily and with fewer errors. Hopper's second compiler, the Flow-Matic, was used to program UNIVAC I and II, which were the first computers available commercially. Admiral Hopper also oversaw the development of the Common Business-Oriented Language (COBOL), one of the first computer programming languages. Admiral Hopper received numerous awards for her work, including the honor of having a U.S. warship named after her.


6: Colored Flare System






When Martha Coston was widowed in 1847, she was only 21 years old. She had four children to support, but she hadn't a clue about how to do so. She was flipping through her dead husband's notebooks when she found plans for a flare system that ships could use to communicate at night. Coston requested the system be tested, but it failed.


Coston was undeterred. She spent the next 10 years revising and perfecting her husband's design for a colored flare system. She consulted with scientists and military officers, but she couldn't figure out how to produce flares that were bright and long-lasting while remaining easy to use at the spur of the moment. One night she took her children to see a fireworks display, and that's when she hit upon the idea of applying some pyrotechnic technology to her flare system. The flare system finally worked, and the U.S. Navy bought the rights. The Coston colored flare system was used extensively during the Civil War.


Unfortunately, the flare system wasn't the best way for Coston to support her family. According to military documents, Coston produced 1,200,000 flares for the Navy during the Civil War, which she provided at cost. She was owed $120,000, of which she was only paid $15,000; in her autobiography, Coston attributed the Navy's refusal to pay to the fact that she was a woman [source: Pilato].


5: The Square-bottomed Paper Bag






Margaret Knight didn't invent the paper bag, but those first paper bags weren't all that useful for carrying things. They were more like envelopes, so there was no way they'd become the grocery store staple that they are today. For that, we have to thank Knight. Knight realized that paper bags should have a square bottom; when weight was distributed across the base in this way, the bags could carry more things.


In 1870, she created a wooden machine that would cut, fold and glue the square bottoms to paper bags. While she was working on an iron prototype of the machine to use for her patent application, she discovered that her design had been stolen by a man named Charles Annan, who had seen her wooden machine a few months earlier. She filed a patent interference suit against Annan, who claimed that there was no way that a woman could have developed such a complex machine. Knight used her notes and sketches to prove otherwise, and she was granted the patent for the device in 1871.


That was hardly Knight's first patent, though. At the age of 12, Knight had developed a stop-motion device that would automatically bring industrial machines to a halt if something was caught on them, which prevented many injuries; all told, Knight was awarded more than 20 patents.


4: Dishwasher






You might think that the first dishwasher was invented by someone who spent years washing dishes, bemoaning the wasted time and the dishpan hands. Actually, Josephine Cochrane, who received the patent for the first working dishwasher, didn't spend that much time washing dishes. The real impetus for her invention was frustration over her servants breaking her heirloom china after fancy dinners.


Cochrane was a socialite who loved to entertain, but after her husband died in 1883, she was left with massive debt. Rather than selling off that beloved china, she focused on building a machine that would wash it properly. Her machine relied upon strong water pressure aimed at a wire rack of dishes, and she received a patent for the device in 1886. Cochrane claimed that inventing the machine was nowhere near as hard as promoting it [source: Lienhard]. At first, the Cochrane dishwasher tanked with individual consumers, as many households lacked the hot water heaters necessary to run it, and those that had the capacity balked at paying for something that housewives did for free. Undaunted, Cochrane sought appointments with large hotels and restaurants, selling them on the fact that the dishwasher could do the job they were paying several dozen employees to do. In time, however, more households acquired the device as greater numbers of women entered the workplace.


3: Windshield Wiper






At the dawn of the 20th century, Mary Anderson went to New York City for the first time. She saw a much different New York City than the one tourists see today. There were no cabs honking, nor were there thousands of cars vying for position in afternoon traffic. Cars had not yet captured the American imagination and were quite rare when Anderson took that trip, but the woman from Alabama would end up inventing something that has become standard on every automobile. During her trip, Anderson took a tram through the snow-covered city.


She noticed that the driver had to stop the tram every few minutes to wipe the snow off his front window. At the time, all drivers had to do so; rain and snow were thought to be things drivers had to deal with, even though they resulted in poor visibility. When she returned home, Anderson developed a squeegee on a spindle that was attached to a handle on the inside of the vehicle. When the driver needed to clear the glass, he simply pulled on the handle and the squeegee wiped the precipitation from the windshield. Anderson received the patent for her device in 1903; just 10 years later, thousands of Americans owned a car with her invention


2: Nystatin






Long-distance romantic relationships are often troubled, but Rachel Fuller Brown and Elizabeth Lee Hazen proved that long-distance professional relationships can yield productive results. Both Brown and Hazen worked for the New York State Department of Health in the 1940s, but Hazen was stationed in New York City and Brown was in Albany. Despite the miles, Brown and Hazen collaborated on the first successful fungus-fighting drug.


In New York City, Hazen would test soil samples to see if any of the organisms within would respond to fungi. If there was activity, Hazen would mail the jar of soil to Brown, who would work to extract the agent in the soil that was causing the reaction. Once Brown had found the active ingredient, it went back in the mail to Hazen, who'd check it against the fungi again. If the organism killed the fungi, it would be evaluated for toxicity. Most of the samples proved too toxic for human use, but finally Brown and Hazen happened upon an effective fungus-killing drug in 1950. They named it Nystatin, after New York state. The medication, now sold under a variety of trade names, cures fungal infections that affect the skin, vagina and intestinal system. It's also been used on trees with Dutch elm disease and on artwork affected by mold.


1: Kevlar






It was just supposed to be a temporary job. Stephanie Kwolek took a position at DuPont in 1946 so she could save enough money to go to medical school. In 1964, she was still there, researching how to turn polymers into extra strong synthetic fibers. Kwolek was working with polymers that had rod-like molecules that all lined up in one direction.


Compared to the molecules that formed jumbled bundles, Kwolek thought the uniform lines would make the resulting material stronger, though these polymers were very difficult to dissolve into a solution that could be tested. She finally prepared such a solution with the rod-like molecules, but it looked unlike all the other molecular solutions she'd ever made. Her next step was to run it through the spinneret, a machine that would produce the fibers. However, the spinneret operator almost refused to let Kwolek use the machine, so different was this solution from all the others before; he was convinced it would ruin the spinneret.


Kwolek persisted, and after the spinneret had done its work, Kwolek had a fiber that was ounce-for-ounce as strong as steel. This material was dubbed Kevlar, and it's been used to manufacture skis, radial tires and brake pads, suspension bridge cables, helmets, and hiking and camping gear. Most notably, Kevlar is used to make bulletproof vests, so even though Kwolek didn't make it to medical school, she still saved plenty of lives.

INDIAN WEDDING FACTS

Indian wedding is a perfect blend of serious rituals and customs along with other fun filled rituals and frothy moments. Wedding marks the beginning of a new relationship not just between two individuals but also between two families and thus, there are various moments in the wedding ceremonies that help to build new relationships. Every caste and community has its own tradition and culture. India with such diverse cultural background showcases variety of rituals and customs. Here are few very interesting facts about various kinds of Indian Wedding:







Interesting Indian Wedding Facts


In many communities in the Hindu Religion, there is a wedding ritual in which the sisters-in-law hide the shoes of their jija or brother-in-law and return them only in exchange for money. It's a very fun filled and enjoying ritual.


In some communities, there are rituals where the hands of the couple are covered with a sacred cloth to ward off ill omen and evil eye during the pheras.


In Parsee marriage ceremonies, the sisters-in-law take gifts from their brother-in-law during the ritual of Haath Boravanu where the groom puts his hand in water and cannot remove them until he pays money to them, Pag Dhovanu is another such ritual where the groom is threatened with milk on his shoes and chero chorvanu is a ritual in which seven strands of thread tying the couple are removed on payment.


In Gujarati custom the groom's mother-in-law tries to catch his nose on arrival of the baraat, as a reminder of the fact that he is taking away their daughter and is now responsible for her happiness.


Aeki-Beki is also very fun filled rituals among the Gujarati community. A tray or pot of water is mixed with milk and vermillion. A ring and a few coins are thrown into the mixture. The bride and groom are given seven chances to fish out the ring. The winner is considered as having a dominating personality and it is predicted amidst much laughter that he or she will rule the roost!


In Punjabi custom the bride's wear a Chuda, this is a set of red and ivory bangles by her maternal uncle. This custom is considered good omen for the bride as it is said to bring good luck to the bride in her new home.


Punjabi brides wear Kaleeres. These are silver or gold plated ornaments tied to the Chudas. It is said that the bride has as many friends as there are leaves in the Kaleere. One interesting ritual related with the Kaleere is the custom in which a bride shakes her Kaleere over the unmarried girls in her family. It is said that if the Kaleere falls on the head of any of them, she is the next one to be married.


Another ritual which is found in almost every community is when the groom brings home his new bride; the groom's sisters block the entrance to the home and demand money from their brother as a shagun before they let him in. This is a fun filled and amusing ritual.

Scientists Agree...

Scientists Agree...







In going about our everyday lives, all of us use science every day, and we never even know it. Science has much to teach us about the world we live in and how to master it. For instance:



•Blue light travels faster than any other color light.


•Vegans and vegetarians regularly eat flesh from animals that die of natural causes since that meat is technically considered "carrion."

•The inside of an ordinary 40-watt lightbulb can become hotter than the surface of the sun.

•So-called "steam locomotives" are actually fuelled by coal or other combustible materials in a small, controlled nuclear reaction.

•Ink from a computer printer, if ingested, is more toxic than mercury.

•30 is technically the lowest prime number.

•Albinos are actually black--it is the refraction of sunlight that makes them "appear" white or colorless.

•Dogs have eight more senses than human beings.

Gravity Facts

Gravity Facts


Enjoy our range of interesting gravity facts that help explain how gravity relates to both life on Earth and other objects in our solar system. Learn about important concepts such as acceleration, mass, tides and orbits as well as some useful formulas, strange trivia and other fun information relating to the topic of gravity.


•Objects with mass are attracted to each other, this is known as gravity.

•Gravity keeps Earth and the other planets in our solar system in orbit around the Sun. It also keeps the Moon in orbit around Earth.

•Tides are caused by the rotation of the Earth and the gravitational effects of the Moon and Sun.

•Because Mars has a lower gravity than Earth, a person weighing 100kg (220 pounds) on Earth would only weigh 38kg (84 pounds) on Mars.

•It is thought that Isaac Newton’s theories on gravity were inspired by seeing an apple fall from a tree.

•While Newton’s older law of universal gravitation is accurate in most scenarios, modern physics uses Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity to describe gravity.

•Acceleration of objects to due to the gravity on Earth is around 9.8 m/s2. If you ignore air resistance (drag) then the speed of an object falling to Earth increases by around 9.8 metres per second every second.

•The force of gravity 100 kilometres (62 miles) above Earth is just 3% less than at the Earth’s surface.

•The human body can handle increased g-forces as seen in activities such as dragster races, airplane acrobatics and space training. The highest known acceleration voluntarily experienced by a human is 46.2 g by g-force pioneer John Stapp.

•While formula one racing drivers may feel around 5 g’s under heavy braking, they can experience over 100 g’s if a crash causes them to decelerate extremely quickly over a very short distance.

•Some roller coasters have been known to include g-forces of around 4 to 6 g.

•The higher something is, the greater its gravitational potential energy. Back in the Middle Ages, weapons called trebuchets were used to take advantage of this principle, using mechanical advantage and the gravitational potential energy of a counterweight to hurl rocks and other projectiles at or over walls. In modern times we use the gravitational potential of water to create hydroelectricity.

Olympics Fun Facts

Olympics Fun Facts



•The early Olympic Games were celebrated as a religious festival from 776 B.C. until 393 A.D., when the games were banned for being a pagan festival (the Olympics celebrated the Greek god Zeus). In 1894, a French educator Baron Pierre de Coubertin, proposed a revival of the ancient tradition, and thus the modern-day Olympic Summer Games were born.


•Host Greece won the most medals (47) at the first Olympic Summer Games in 1896.


•The first Winter Olympic Games were held in Chamonix, France in 1924.


•Norway has won the most medals (263) at the Winter Games.


•The United States has won more medals (2,189) at the Summer Games than any other country.


•The five Olympic rings represent the five major regions of the world – Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe and Oceana, and every national flag in the world includes one of the five colors, which are (from left to right) blue, yellow, black, green, and red.


•Up until 1994 the Olympics were held every four years. Since then, the Winter and Summer games have alternated every two years.


•The first Olympics covered by U.S. television was the 1960 Summer Games in Rome by CBS.


•No country in the Southern Hemisphere has ever hosted a Winter Games.


•Three continents – Africa, South America, and Antarctica – have never hosted an Olympics.


•A record 202 countries participated in the 2004 Olympic Summer Games in Athens.


•Only four athletes have ever won medals at both the Winter and Summer Olympic Games: Eddie Eagan (United States), Jacob Tullin Thams (Norway), Christa Luding-Rothenburger (East Germany), and Clara Hughes (Canada).


•Speed skater Bonnie Blair has won six medals at the Olympic Winter Games. That's more than any other American athlete.


•Nobody has won more medals at the Winter Games than cross-country skier Bjorn Dählie of Norway, who has 12.


•Larrisa Latynina, a gymnast from the former Soviet Union, finished her Summer Olympic Games career with 18 total medals—the most in history.


•The United States Olympic Committee established the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame in 1983 to recognize outstanding American Olympic athletes, however, a plan to build a hall has been suspended due to lack of funding.


•The Summer Olympic sports are archery, badminton, basketball, beach volleyball, boxing, canoe / kayak, cycling, diving, equestrian, fencing, field hockey, gymnastics, handball, judo, modern pentathlon (shooting, fencing, swimming, show jumping, and running), mountain biking, rowing, sailing, shooting, soccer, swimming, synchronized swimming, table tennis, taekwondo, tennis, track and field, triathlon (swimming, biking, running), volleyball, water polo, weightlifting, and wrestling.


•The Winter Olympic sports are alpine skiing, biathlon (cross-country skiing and target shooting), bobsled, cross-country skiing, curling, figure skating, freestyle skiing, ice hocky, luge, Nordic combined (ski jumping and cross-country skiing), skeleton, ski jumping, snowboarding, and speed skating.


Olympics Fun Facts



•The early Olympic Games were celebrated as a religious festival from 776 B.C. until 393 A.D., when the games were banned for being a pagan festival (the Olympics celebrated the Greek god Zeus). In 1894, a French educator Baron Pierre de Coubertin, proposed a revival of the ancient tradition, and thus the modern-day Olympic Summer Games were born.


•Host Greece won the most medals (47) at the first Olympic Summer Games in 1896.


•The first Winter Olympic Games were held in Chamonix, France in 1924.


•Norway has won the most medals (263) at the Winter Games.


•The United States has won more medals (2,189) at the Summer Games than any other country.


•The five Olympic rings represent the five major regions of the world – Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe and Oceana, and every national flag in the world includes one of the five colors, which are (from left to right) blue, yellow, black, green, and red.


•Up until 1994 the Olympics were held every four years. Since then, the Winter and Summer games have alternated every two years.


•The first Olympics covered by U.S. television was the 1960 Summer Games in Rome by CBS.


•No country in the Southern Hemisphere has ever hosted a Winter Games.


•Three continents – Africa, South America, and Antarctica – have never hosted an Olympics.


•A record 202 countries participated in the 2004 Olympic Summer Games in Athens.


•Only four athletes have ever won medals at both the Winter and Summer Olympic Games: Eddie Eagan (United States), Jacob Tullin Thams (Norway), Christa Luding-Rothenburger (East Germany), and Clara Hughes (Canada).


•Speed skater Bonnie Blair has won six medals at the Olympic Winter Games. That's more than any other American athlete.


•Nobody has won more medals at the Winter Games than cross-country skier Bjorn Dählie of Norway, who has 12.


•Larrisa Latynina, a gymnast from the former Soviet Union, finished her Summer Olympic Games career with 18 total medals—the most in history.


•The United States Olympic Committee established the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame in 1983 to recognize outstanding American Olympic athletes, however, a plan to build a hall has been suspended due to lack of funding.


•The Summer Olympic sports are archery, badminton, basketball, beach volleyball, boxing, canoe / kayak, cycling, diving, equestrian, fencing, field hockey, gymnastics, handball, judo, modern pentathlon (shooting, fencing, swimming, show jumping, and running), mountain biking, rowing, sailing, shooting, soccer, swimming, synchronized swimming, table tennis, taekwondo, tennis, track and field, triathlon (swimming, biking, running), volleyball, water polo, weightlifting, and wrestling.


•The Winter Olympic sports are alpine skiing, biathlon (cross-country skiing and target shooting), bobsled, cross-country skiing, curling, figure skating, freestyle skiing, ice hocky, luge, Nordic combined (ski jumping and cross-country skiing), skeleton, ski jumping, snowboarding, and speed skating.

Mathematics and fun for children

•Mathematics is important in many different types of jobs, including engineering, business, science, medicine and more.







•It is believed that Ancient Egyptians used complex mathematics such as algebra, arithmetic and geometry as far back as 3000 BC.






•It wasn’t until the 16th century that most mathematical symbols were invented. Before this time math equations were written in words, making it very time consuming.






•What comes after a million, billion and trillion? Why a quadrillion, quintillion, sextillion, septillion, octillion and nonillion of course.






•Cutting a cake into 8 pieces is possible with just 3 slices, can you work out how?






•An icosagon is a shape with 20 sides.






•A three dimensional parallelogram is called a parallelepiped.






•Trigonometry is the study of the relationship between the angles of triangles and their sides.






•The smallest ten prime numbers are: 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23, 29.






•The name of the popular search engine ‘Google’ came from a misspelling of the word ‘googol’, which is a very, very large number (the number one followed by one hundred zeros to be exact).






•A ‘googolplex’ is the number 1 followed by a googol zeros, this number is so big that it can’t be written because there isn’t enough room in the universe to fit it in! It would also take a length of time far greater than the age of the universe just to write the numbers.






•The number Pi (the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle) can’t be expressed as a fraction, this means it is an irrational number. When written as a decimal it never repeats and never ends.






•Here is Pi written to 50 decimal places: 3.14159265358979323846264338327950288419716939937510






•If two quantities have a ratio of approximately 1.618, they are said to be in the golden ratio. This ratio has been used throughout history to design aesthetically pleasing art works such as the Parthenon. It also appears in paintings, music, the design of books, and even in nature.