History of firearmas..Guns, Rifles, Machine Guns, and Firearm Ammunition By Mary Bellis, About.com Guide

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2. Since the introduction of the flintlock musket in the 17th century, military small arms have gone through a series of significant changes.

3. Muskets

4. Puckle Gun - 1718
5. In 1718, James Puckle of London, England, demonstrated his new invention, the "Puckle Gun," a tripod-mounted, single-barreled flintlock gun fitted with a multishot revolving cylinder. This weapon fired nine shots per minute at a time when the standard soldier's musket could be loaded and fired but three times per minute. Puckle demonstrated two versions of the basic design. One weapon, intended for use against Christian enemies, fired conventional round bullets, while the second variant, designed to be used against the Muslim Turks, fired square bullets, which were believed to cause more severe and painful wounds than spherical projectiles. The "Puckle Gun" failed to attract investors and never achieved mass production or sales to the British armed forces. One newspaper of the period observed following the business venture's failure that "those are only wounded who hold shares therein."
6. James Puckle
7. According to the Patent Office of the United Kingdom, "In the reign of Queen Anne, the law officers of the Crown established as a condition of patent that the inventor must in writing describe the invention and the manner in which it works." James Puckle's 1718 patent for a gun was one of the first to provide a description.

8. Revolvers

11. History of the Colt Revolver
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13. Samuel Colt invented the first revolver - named after its revolving cylinder. He was issued a U.S. patent in 1836 for the Colt firearm equipped with a revolving cylinder containing five or six bullets with an innovative cocking device. 
14. Samuel Colt

15. Rifles

18. The breech-loading rifle was invented by Captain Patrick Ferguson of Pitfours, Scotland.
21. John Moses Browning - Winchester Rifle
24. John Moses Brownig
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28. John Moses Browning was the prolific gun designer who invented the Winchester rifle (30/30), the pump shotgun, and the Colt 45 automatic. He is best known for his automatic pistols and was the first one to invent the slide, which encloses the barrel of a pistol and the firing mechanism.
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32. John Moses Browning
35. Modern Assault Rifles - M16 History
36. The history of the modern assault rifle begins with the German Sturmgewehr used during WW2, the first rifle that could fire a medium size bullet at high rates of fire. In response the U.S. military began developing their own assault rifle, the result was the M16 assault rifle, first issued to American Soldiers in Vietnam in 1968 and designed by Eugene Stoner, a Marine Corps Veteran.
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40. John Garand - M1 Semiautomatic Rifle
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44. Canadian, John Garand invented the M1 semiautomatic rifle in 1934.
45. The Johnson Rifle
46. The Johnson Model 1941 Rifle one of the most innovative rifles of its time period. The Johnson rifle was invented by Melvin M. Johnson Jr.
47. Samuel Gardiner
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49. Samuel Gardiner, Jr. received a U.S. Patent in 1863 on a "high explosive rifle bullet" in .54, .58, and .69 calibers. Fused to explode 1 1/4 seconds after firing, it ensured that any soldier hit by the projectile with a range of 400 yards faced the danger of the bullet exploding within the impact wound. The U.S. Government purchased 110,000 rounds of such ammunition for issue during the Civil War. Criticizing the use of similar ammunition by the Confederates, General Ulysses S. Grant complained that "their use is barbarous because they produce increased suffering without any increased advantage to using them."
50. Rifle Scopes
51. A rifle scope is a refractor telescope used on a rifle. In 1880, August Fiedler (Stronsdorf), forestry commissioner of Prince Reuss, managed to build the first telescopic sight that really did work.
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53. Machine Guns
54. Gatling Gun - 1861
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56. Doctor Richard Gatling patented his design of the "Gatling Gun", a six-barreled weapon capable of firing a (then) phenomenal 200 rounds per minute.
57. Maxim Machine Gun - 1885
58. In 1881, a friend of Hiram Maxim, the American inventor, told him: "If you wanted to make a lot of money, invent something that will enable these Europeans to cut each other's throats with. Hiram Maxim was born in Sangersville, Maine in 1840 and was the inventor of the Maxim Machine Gun and the Maxim Silencer.
59. Thompson Submachine Gun - Tommy Gun
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61. The Thompson submachine gun or Tommy gun was invented by General John T. Thompson, it was the first hand held machine gun. Thompson was driven with the thought of creating a hand held machinegun that would help end the First World War, However, "the first shipment of prototype guns destined for Europe arrived at the docks in New York city on November 11, 1918, the day the War ended."
62. Silencers
63. Hiram Maxim (born 1853) invented the Maxim Silencer or Suppressor: that attached to the front of the barrel of a pistol and allowed the firearm to be fired without a loud bang. Invented in 1909, the Maxim Suppressor was the first commercially successful silencer.

Mary Phelps Jacob..inventor of the bra in 1907

In 1907 Mary Phelps Jacob, a New York socialite, bought herself a new, sheer fabric, evening dress. The existing undergarments of the time showed beneath this flimsy dress and caused her a problem, so she set to work with her maid and they designed their own bra. The makeshift item was fashioned from two silk handkerchiefs, ribbon and cord.

Before Mary and her maid knew what was happening, everybody wanted one of these new, comfortable undergarments.

In 1914 a US patent was granted for the “backless bra”. This style of bra was more of a flattener than a supporting device and the invention became popular during the 1920’s flapper era.

Bras had been commercially produced during the 1860’s were unsuccessful because they were cumbersome and uncomfortable and came into he “corset” category.

By the mid 1920’s new designs made this item more comfortable to wear and provided lift and support for the figure but it was not until the 1930’s that this industry really moved forward. Prior to this the word “bra” was little used. The term has been “brassiere”, or “corset”. 1930’s women had more freedom and a choice of fabrics, colours and sizes.

More structured, shaped bras began to appear during the 1940’s and 50’s, but it wasn’t until the 1960’s that there was a wide range of fabrics, styles and sizes at affordable prices.

From 1970 onwards there has been a huge change in this market. There were many styles of bra available in silk, nylon, polyester, cotton and a myriad of other fabrics. These became available in a whole range of back and cup sizes in any colour of the rainbow you could possibly imagine.

In the year 2001 the bra industry in US was worth a cool 15 billion dollars with manufacturers Berlei and Gossard taking the largest share. Designs have come a long way from those two silk handkerchiefs of 1907.

Mary Phelps Jacob..inventor of the bra in 1907.

First bra patented.

Cretan Bra used over a thousand years ago.
Fashion Bra became popular in 1924.

2007 marks the 100years of bra.

Reginald Fessenden Invented radio broadcasting (1906)

Reginald Fessenden.(

 (1866-1931)

By Mary Bellis
Canadian-born Reginald Fessenden had been trained as an electrician. So when Edison wanted to make him a chemist, Reginald Fessenden protested. Edison replied, "I have had a lot of chemists . . . but none of them can get results." Reginald Fessenden turned out to be an excellent chemist, working with insulation for electrical wires. He left the West Orange lab around 1889 and patented several inventions of his own, including patents for telephony and telegraphy. In 1906, Reginald Fessenden became the first person to broadcast words and music over radio waves.
Reginald Fessenden - Extracts From National Capitol Commission of Canada;
Canadian, Reginald Fessenden is best known for his invention of the modulation of radio waves and the fathometer. Fessenden worked as as a chemist for Thomas Edison during the 1880s and later for Westinghouse. Reginald Fessenden started his own company where he invented the modulation of radio waves, the "heterodyne principle" which allowed the reception and transmission on the same aerial without interference. On Christmas Eve, 1906, ships off the Atlantic coast with Fessenden-designed equipment broadcast the first trans-Atlantic voice transmission. Fessenden held over 500 patents and won Scientific American's Gold Medal in 1929 for the fathometer, which could measure the depth of water beneath a ship's keel.
At the end of the 19th century, people communicated by radio using Morse code - sputtering dots and dashes that trained radio operators could decode into a message. A Canadian inventor, Reginald Fessenden, changed all that. In 1900 he transmitted the world's first voice message. It took six years for Reginald Fessenden to refine his invention but on Christmas Eve, 1906, Reginald Fessenden made the first radio broadcast in history. In the 1920s, vessels of all sizes were using Fessenden's "depth sounding" technology. Thomas Edison invented the first commercial light bulb. ButReginald Fessenden re-invented the light bulb and did it better.

PLASTICS AND THEIR DISCOVERY

First man made plastic forks.

Celluloid is derived from cellulose and alcoholized camphor. John Wesley Hyatt invented celluloid as a substitute for the ivory in billiard balls in 1868. He first tried using collodion a natural substance, after spilling a bottle of it and discovering that the material dried into a tough and flexible film. However, the material was not strong enough to be used as a billiard ball, until the addition of camphor, a derivative of the laurel tree. The new celluloid could be molded with heat and pressure into a durable shape.

Besides billiard balls, celluloid became famous as the first flexible photographic film used for still photography and motion pictures. John Wesley Hyatt created celluloid in a strip format for movie film. By 1900, movie film was an exploding market for celluloid.

Formaldehyde Resins - Bakelite

After cellulose nitrate, formaldehyde was the next product to advance the technology of plastic. Around 1897, efforts to manufacture white chalkboards led to casein plastics (milk protein mixed with formaldehyde) Galalith and Erinoid are two early tradename examples.

In 1899, Arthur Smith received British Patent 16,275, for "phenol-formaldehyde resins for use as an ebonite substitute in electrical insulation", the first patent for processing a formaldehyde resin. However, in 1907, Leo Hendrik Baekeland improved phenol-formaldehyde reaction techniques and invented the first fully synthetic resin to become commercially successful, tradenamed Bakelite.

Timeline - Precursors

• 1839 - Natural Rubber - method of processing invented by Charles Goodyear
• 1843 - Vulcanite - Thomas Hancock
• 1843 - Gutta-Percha - William Montgomerie
• 1856 - Shellac - Alfred Critchlow, Samuel Peck
• 1856 - Bois Durci - Francois Charles Lepag

Timeline - Beginning of the Plastic Era with Semi Synthetics

• 1839 - Polystyrene or PS discovered - Eduard Simon
• 1862 - Parkesine - Alexander Parkes
• 1863 - Cellulose Nitrate or Celluloid - John Wesley Hyatt
• 1872 - Polyvinyl Chloride or PVC - first created by Eugen Baumann
• 1894 - Viscose Rayon - Charles Frederick Cross, Edward John Bevan

Timeline - Thermosetting Plastics and Thermoplastics

• 1909 - First true plastic Phenol-Formaldehyde tradenamed Bakelite
- Leo Hendrik Baekeland
• 1926 - Vinyl or PVC - Walter Semon invented a plasticized PVC.....................................>
• 1927 - Cellulose Acetate
• 1933 - Polyvinylidene chloride or Saran also called PVDC - accidentally discovered by Ralph Wiley, a Dow Chemical lab worker.
• 1935 - Low-density polyethylene or LDPE - Reginald Gibson and Eric Fawcett
• 1936 - Acrylic or Polymethyl Methacrylate
• 1937 - Polyurethanes tradenamed Igamid for plastics materials and Perlon for fibers. - Otto Bayer and co-workers discovered and patented the chemistry of polyurethanes
• 1938 - Polystyrene made practical
• 1938 - Polytetrafluoroethylene or PTFE tradenamed Teflon - Roy Plunkett....>
• 1939 - Nylon and Neoprene
considered a replacement for silk and a synthetic rubber respectively Wallace Hume Carothers
• 1941 - Polyethylene Terephthalate or Pet - Whinfield and Dickson
• 1942 - Low Density Polyethylene
• 1942 - Unsaturated Polyester also called PET patented by John Rex Whinfield and James Tennant Dickson
• 1951 - High-density polyethylene or HDPE tradenamed Marlex - Paul Hogan and Robert Banks
• 1951 - Polypropylene or PP - Paul Hogan and Robert Banks

• troduced by Dow Chemicals.

Roy Plunkett

• 1954 - Styrofoam a type of foamed polystyrene foam was invented by Ray McIntire 
• for Dow Chemicals...
• 1964 - Polyimide
• 1970 - Thermoplastic Polyester this includes trademarked Dacron, Mylar, Melinex, Teijin, and Tetoron
• 1978 - Linear Low Density Polyethylene
• 1985 - Liquid Crystal Polymers.
• • 1908 - Cellophane ® - Jacques E. Brandenberger
  

• Jacques E. Brandenberger.

  Leo Hendrik Baekfield