1000 Inventions and Discoveries

Modern Glass is 1851 – 1900
microscope clear
condenser where it Barbed wire
has not
c 1870 been 1874
exposed
Ernst Abbe Back- Joseph Glidden
ground
The image-forming lenses of How an invention is made
of a microscope are spectrum can matter more than what
important, but until about it is. Barbed wire is an example.
1870, nobody had thought Lines Early types cost so much to
much about the optics that show make that few people used
simply illuminate the object presence them. US farmer Joseph
– the condenser. Early of Glidden saw some barbed wire
microscopists used condensers, elements in 1873, and the following year
but German physicist Ernst patented a new type that could
Abbe’s was the first scientific be made cheaply by machine.
design. Most microscopes now Soon his Barb Fence Company
have Abbe condensers.
was turning out miles of
Dry cattle-controlling wire and
photographic helping to make the USA’s
Great Plains into great
plate farming country.

1871 Dry plate Dry photographic plate Dry
plates were useful to scientists.
Richard Maddox Print made These show spark spectra (c 1915).
from the plate
Although wet plates in the road. To move, the cable Jeans What we call jeans did not
produced excellent 1871, British doctor Richard cars grab the rope; to stop, they get their name for years. This 1910
photographs (✷ see page Maddox mixed some gelatine let go and apply their brakes. advertisement calls them overalls.
139), they were not safe or with silver bromide and spread
convenient. Photographers it on glass. When it was dry, Jeans DNA
searched everywhere for the the new coating stayed
magic ingredient that would sensitive, could be developed 1873 1874
allow them to make dry plates. easily, and needed shorter
They eventually found it in the exposure times. Modern Jacob Davis, Levi Strauss Johann Miescher
kitchen cupboard: gelatine. In photography had arrived.
In the 1850s, the US’s gold DNA, the key to genetics
“Ivory” Cable car rush attracted people from and life, may seem like
hairbrush everywhere. Levi Strauss had the latest thing, but it was
1873 a business that supplied them discovered in 1874. Swiss
with everything they needed, scientist Johann Miescher was
“Ivory” Andrew Hallidie including pants. Tailor Jacob a student when he found a new
clothes-brush Davis started making denim substance, which he called
Andrew Hallidie, a pants with riveted pockets, and nuclein, in the nucleus of white
wire-rope maker in the suggested to Strauss that they blood cells. He later realized
US, was shocked to see five could make lots of money. So that it was actually two
horses killed as a horse-drawn Strauss provided cash to substances. Separating out the
bus slid down one of San get started, Davis supplied the acid part, he called it nucleic
Francisco’s steep hills. So he know-how, and in 1873 they acid. It is now known as
used his ropes to create the got the first patent for jeans. deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA.
world’s first cable cars. It
opened in 1873 and is still
running today. Cable cars are
pulled along by a constantly
moving rope running in a slot

1872 In the US, the preserves Yellowstone, an 1873 Canada forms a new Mounted Police, later the Royal
world’s first national 3,468 sq mile (8,983 sq km) police force to Canadian Mounted Police, will
park is opened. The president, area in the Rocky Mountains, combat smuggling, horse theft, become famous as the Mounties,
Ulysses S. Grant, signs a bill that as a permanent wilderness. and banditry. The Northwest who “always get their man.”

149

Science takeS control Paper wrapped Telephone
TypewriTer This around a
1875 Sholes and cylindrical 1876
Glidden machine patten
typed in capital
letters only. Alexander Graham Bell

Type bars See pages 152–153 for the
hit the story of how Bell invented
the telephone.
paper from
below Sound
recording
QWERTY
keyboard 1877

Typewriter business took a back seat. The drawn into Thomas Edison
layout of the keyboard was a cylinder,
1874 developed to stop fast typists compressed, In 1877, US inventor Thomas
from jamming the burned, and the Edison was working on a
Christopher Sholes, keys, and is still burned gases pumped recorder for telegraph signals.
Carlos Glidden, used today. out. The first person to He noticed that paper indented
Samuel Soulé think of it was French with the signals made sounds
Four-stroke engineer Alphonse Beau de when pulled under a needle. So
As an ex-newspaper editor, engine Rochas in 1862. His work was he made a machine with tinfoil
Christopher Sholes knew forgotten and reinvented wrapped around a revolving
exactly what a typewriter had 1876 by German engineer cylinder and a needle connected
to do: write faster than a pen. Nikolaus Otto in 1876. to a thin metal disc. When he
Many people had tried and Alphonse Beau de Rochas, Despite de Rochas’ spoke, the disc vibrated and
failed to produce such a Nikolaus Otto earlier work, the cycle the needle indented waves on
machine, but Sholes, helped by is still known today as the tinfoil. Turning the cylinder
fellow US inventors Carlos Most gasoline and diesel the Otto cycle. again, Edison heard his own
Glidden and Samuel Soulé, engines use the four- voice. He had invented sound
succeeded. In 1873, he sold the stroke cycle. Fuel and air are recording. (✷ See also
idea to Remington, a firm of Recording pioneers.)
gunmakers. They launched the
world’s first real typewriter in Sound recording
1874, after which their gun A phonograph
from about
1885 shows
recording at
its simplest.

Needle
touches the
cylinder here

Handle for
turning the
cylinder

1874 British writer Madding Crowd. It describes the 1874 A group of artists own show. Journalist Louis Leroy,
Thomas Hardy tragic relationships of heroine including Monet, shocked by pictures that capture
establishes his reputation with Pisarro, and Renoir, rejected by real light and color, dubs them
his fourth novel, Far from the Bathsheba Everdene with three the French Academy, hold their the Impressionists.

150 very different men.

Photographic outside and left the cream in Microphone 1851 – 1900
motion capture the centre. By 1883, Laval had
built a steam-powered 1878 Two-stroke
1877 separator, 40 times faster than a engine
modern washing machine. David Hughes
Eadweard Muybridge 1879
Light bulb Returning to London after
Eadweard Muybridge was making a fortune in the Dugald Clerk
born in Britain but worked 1878 US, David Hughes set up as
in the US. He was the first a full-time inventor. In 1878, Atwo-stroke engine uses
person to record live motion Thomas Edison, Joseph Swan he discovered that loose more fuel than a four-
photographically. A racehorse electrical contacts were stroke engine of the same
owner had asked him to settle In 1878, both Thomas Edison sensitive to sound. Two barely power, but it also weighs less.
an argument: did a galloping in the US and the chemist touching carbon rods placed Its mechanism is simpler, and
horse ever lift all its hooves off Joseph Swan in Britain made on a table and connected to a each of its cylinders delivers
the ground at once? In 1877, light bulbs. Both of them had battery and telephone earpiece power on every revolution, not
Muybridge set up a row of trouble finding a filament that could reveal sounds as quiet as every other revolution, as in a
cameras along a racetrack. As a would last long. Edison tried the tramp of a fly’s feet. These four-stroke. The first effective
horse galloped by, it tripped platinum, but soon switched to sounds were so tiny that two-stroke engine was invented
their shutters, making each carbon, which Swan had first Hughes called his invention a by Scottish engineer Dugald
camera record a different part tried 20 years earlier. By 1880, microphone. Its real future was Clerk in 1879 and patented in
of the movement. The answer both inventors had produced as part of a better telephone. 1881. It was designed to run
to the question was “yes.” good light bulbs, which they on coal gas to power workshop
showed off at the 1881 Paris Carbon rods Connecting machinery. Two-stroke engines
Cream Electrical Exhibition. From wires are now used for things like
separator then on, their lamps began scooters and lawnmowers,
to be used everywhere. where lightness matters more
1878 than efficiency.

Gustav de Laval microphone Two Wooden
carbon rods touch base
Skimmed milk isn’t skimmed to form one type of
– it’s spun like clothes in a Hughes microphone.
washing machine. The first
cream separator using this RECORDING PIONEERS
principle was invented in 1878
by Swedish engineer Gustav de The early recording industry solved its
Laval. In its final form, his problems step by step. Tinfoil was not a good
machine poured milk on to a recording medium. It was soon replaced by wax.
set of spinning discs, which Edison produced cylindrical records on his
forced the watery part to the phonograph, but they were slow and expensive to
copy. Flat discs, which could be stamped out by the
Threaded drive axle moves the thousand, dealt with that. But the problem of how
tinfoil beneath the needle to make sounds louder was not solved until the

arrival of electronics in the 1920s.

Brass The phonoGraph The Graphophone Early 20th-century gramophone
cylinder – Edison developed his Recordings on wax
tinfoil is invention into a were first made by US The Gramophone
wrapped sophisticated home inventors Chichester Flat disc records were invented
around this entertainment device that Bell and Charles Tainter. in 1887 by a German engineer,
could produce surprisingly Their machine recorded Emil Berliner, working in the
good sound. He eventually on cylinders that were US. Because of their shape, they
solved the problem of wax-coated. Although were easily mass-produced.
copying cylindrical used mainly for dictation, And when renowned musicians
recordings, but failed to sign it could produce started recording on them, their
up many good musicians. excellent recordings. future was assured.

1875On Wednesday, swim the English Channel 1876Financed by wealthy ballet Swan Lake. In 1877, it is
August 25, British without any buoyancy aid. He widow Nadezhda danced, with little success, by
merchant navy captain Matthew completes the 21 mile (34 km) von Meck, Russian composer the Bolshoi Ballet under
Webb becomes the first person to crossing in 21 hours 45 minutes. Peter Tchaikowsky writes the choreographer Wenzel Reisinger.

151

Science takeS control

DOING AWAY WITH DISTANCE

Helped by Thomas Watson,
Alexander Graham Bell invents the telephone

It was Valentine’s day, 1876. A good day to tell
the world about an invention that would help people
communicate. It’s lucky Alexander Graham Bell didn’t

leave it any longer. Two hours after he’d deposited papers

describing his telephone to people at the US Patent

Office, his rival, Elisha Gray,

Bell’s box telephone warned them that he was about to
incorporated a larger do the same. But Bell was first.
magnet than others, which
made it more sensitive. It was hard on Gray. Both men had
similar ideas but Bell had an advantage:

Bell demonstrated this he knew more about speech and hearing.
telephone to Queen Bell’s father was a speech teacher and had
Victoria.

Publicity machine invented a way to help deaf people speak.
Bell was an expert His grandfather had given speech lessons,
at publicity. His so as Alexander grew up in Edinburgh,
crude laboratory Scotland, he was surrounded by ideas
instruments about speech and hearing. He even got
became fine his dog to talk by making it growl, then
objects of moving its mouth with his hands!
polished brass,
rich wood, and ivory when The family emigrated to Canada in
they were to be demonstrated 1870. Bell went to Boston, where he opened a school for teachers of the
to someone as important as deaf. He experimented with a harmonic telegraph, which sent messages as
Queen Victoria. Bell made a dots and dashes similar to musical notes. Bell noticed that a strip of iron
good impression on the Queen near an electromagnet mimicked the vibrations of a similar strip and
when they met in 1878,
despite making the mistake of electromagnet connected to it by
touching her arm without
permission to attract her
attention to an incoming call.

wires. He thought he might use

this to transmit speech.

With mechanic Thomas

Watson, he tried hard to make

Early telephone cable electric currents imitate sound

Wired for sound waves. The original arrangement wasn’t sensitive enough, so Bell tried a
As telephones became more needle dipping into acid. The needle was attached to a sheet of parchment
popular, cities got choked with stretched on a frame, with a horn to concentrate sound on to it. Sound
overhead wires, so some lines shook the parchment, which varied the resistance of the needle’s contact
went underground. Early phone with the acid, which, in turn, varied the current.
cables contained many paper-
insulated wires in a lead sheath.

152

1851 – 1900

The first successful telephone
contained acid. Bell may have
called out to Watson because
he had spilled some.

simple but effeCtive
By 1877, Bell’s instrument had
become a pair of identical
wooden “telephones,” each
containing a bar magnet,
a coil of wire, and a
thin iron disc.

The telephone didn’t work at first. But on Friday, Section through
March 10, 1876, while Bell was fiddling with the transmitter 1878 telephone
in one room and Watson was working on the receiver in
another, Bell said, “Mr. Watson, come here, I want you.” Bell
And Watson came. He had heard Bell’s words, the first “butterstamp”
ever spoken on a telephone. Bell’s earlier patent did
not include the liquid transmitter that made the telephone
transmission of speech possible, so he went back to
his original design and improved it. By 1877, he had Close Call
started a company and was giving demonstrations. An 1877 Bell advertisement
shows early telephones in use.
Bell grew rich from the telephone. He used some of his money to help Bell’s system contained no
deaf people, and some to build a home in Canada. He made several more amplification, making
inventions and became president of the National Geographic Society, distant calls faint. This
turning its magazine into the publication we know today. But Bell will was remedied by
always be remembered best for doing away with the distance that can the invention
separate two people who need to talk. of the carbon
microphone
(✷ see page 151).

153

Science takeS control Saccharin supply system. It opened in Electric
New York in September 1882, streetcar
Cash register 1879 a year after Edison had
demonstrated the idea in 1883
1879 Ira Remsen, London. Edison’s system
Constantin Fahlberg provided brighter, safer lighting Magnus Volk
James Ritty, John Patterson than gas, but it used direct
Saccharin is very much current, which did not transmit Atram is an electric bus that
Acash register records every sweeter than sugar and does over long distances. Because of runs on rails in the road.
sale, preventing store not make people fat, so it is this, it lost out to alternating Many inventors created trams
clerks from putting money into used a lot in food and beverages, current in the end. in the early 1880s. The German
their own pockets. The first despite its disagreeable firm Siemens and Halske was
one was invented by US tavern aftertaste. US chemist Ira Trolley car operating trams between
keeper James Ritty in 1879. It Remsen and his student Frankfurt and Offenbach
displayed the money paid on a Constantin Fahlberg discovered 1882
dial, and recorded it by it by accident in 1879. They eleCtriC streetCar This is a
punching a paper roll. It wasn’t noticed that after one session in Werner von Siemens, model of a double-decker streetcar
easy to use, and cash registers the lab everything they touched Leo Daft that operated in London in about
caught on only after coal tasted sweet. They soon tracked 1915. Streetcars were a feature of
merchant John Patterson down the chemical responsible Atrolley car has an many large cities by 1900. Some
bought the idea. As well as for this and turned it into a electric motor and places abandoned them; others kept
improving it, he set up the commercial product. takes its electricity from them. Now some cities are bringing
world’s first professional sales overhead wires. The first back this form of transportation.
force to sell it. Venn diagram was a converted horse cab,
which German engineer
Cash register Many early cash 1880 Werner von Siemens
registers, like this one from 1935, demonstrated in 1882.
had dials rather than keys. John Venn A few years later, US
engineer Leo Daft gave
Electric train Venn diagrams help with the vehicle its name and
logic. They were invented built the first real trolley
1879 in 1880 in England by a car systems. Most trolley
Cambridge University cars stopped running in
Werner von Siemens instructor, John Venn, and use the 1960s, but because
circles to stand for different they are clean and green
As soon as good electric things. For example, suppose they could yet make a
motors were available they there is one circle representing comeback in some towns.
were used in trains. The first cats, another black things, and
electric train was exhibited in a third green things. The cat Function
Berlin, Germany, in 1879. Built circle would be drawn to of thyroid
by German engineer Werner overlap the black circle, but not
von Siemens, it ran in a circle, the green circle, to show that gland
took only 30 people, and went some cats are black but no cats
no faster than 4 mph (6 km/h). are green. The idea can be 1883
Within five years, real electric extended to much more
trains and trams were running complicated statements. Victor Horsley
in Germany, the US, and Britain.
Public electricity The thyroid gland
supply lies in the neck,
wrapped around the voice
1882 box. In 1883, Victor Horsley
(later Sir Victor) proved that
Thomas Edison the gland’s job is to control
how fast the body burns food
Electric light bulbs were – called its metabolic rate.
not much use without He did this by removing the
electricity. One of their thyroid glands from monkeys.
inventors, Thomas Edison, We now know that the thyroid
knew this very well, so he gland makes a hormone that
built the first public electricity speeds up the body’s cells.

1879 In Boston, Scientist. Christian Scientists 1881P. T. Barnum, James Earth.” Starring Jumbo the
Massachusetts, believe that humans are spiritual, A. Bailey, and James Elephant from April 1882, it will
religious leader Mary Baker Eddy not material, and value prayer L. Hutchinson form the circus become the most successful circus
founds the First Church of Christ, above conventional medicine. known as “The Greatest Show on of its time in the United States.

154

in 1884, but the first tramway Induction InductIon motor 1851 – 1900
to take paying passengers was motor Tesla’s original
probably one built in 1883 by motor did not look Windings
British engineer Magnus Volk. 1883 much like the Rotor
Running on narrow-gauge machines of today,
Nikola Tesla but its operating Placed in this
tracks along the sea front principle was rotating field, a
at Brighton, England, An induction motor is an the same. conducting rotor will
it is still in service. electric motor that has no He worked out spin. This is because the field
electrical connections to the how to create a induces currents in the rotor,
Wires collect part that rotates. This makes rotating magnetic field using turning it into a magnet, which
electricity from it more reliable, because there stationary electrical windings. is pushed around as the field
overhead are no sliding contacts. It was rotates. Induction motors now
cables to power invented in 1883 by Serbian- power most of the world’s
the streetcar electrically driven machinery.
US engineer Nikola Tesla.
Three-phase
electricity
supply

1883

Nikola Tesla,
George Westinghouse

Athree-phase electricity
supply uses three wires
instead of two. It gives two
different voltages from one
set of wires, and can create the
rotating magnetic field needed
in an induction motor. The

idea occurred to Nikola Tesla
in 1883. US engineer George
Westinghouse, looking for
something better than
Edison’s supply system,
bought Tesla’s idea in 1888.

Today nearly all household
electricity is delivered
by three-phase systems.

Metal wheels Car has controls
ran along rails at both ends so
it does not have
to turn around

1882 Judo begins in Japan his Kodokan School. Fighters in 1883 The volcanic island The explosion is heard 5,000 km
when Kano Jigoro this unarmed combat sport try to of Krakatau in (3,000 miles) away. Thousands
learns about a samurai form of master their opponent by turning Indonesia destroys itself in one are killed and dust pollutes the
fighting called jujitsu and founds their own force against them. of the world’s biggest eruptions. atmosphere for years.

155

Science takeS control engine that he had designed Adder-lister The Bicycle The Rover in this 1888
(✷ see page 157). It got its first Burroughs machine advertisement has all the essential
Artificial silk outing on November 10, 1886. had an intricate features of a modern bike.
mechanism.
1884 Multistage Bicycle hub
steam turbine 1885. It had gear
Hilaire Chardonnet, more than 80
Joseph Swan 1884 keys, arranged in 1885
columns of nine,
Artificial silk was the first Charles Parsons and a handle to operate the W. T. Shaw
synthetic fibre. In about printer. The following year
1880 both Hilaire Chardonnet Asteam turbine is like a fan Burroughs formed the Cycling uphill is easier if you
in France and Joseph Swan in in reverse. Steam rushes American Arithmometer can change into a lower
Britain made “silk” by squirting through blades, making them Company. He continued to gear. British engineer W. T. Shaw
cellulose nitrate solution spin. If there were only one set develop his machine, but it was one of the first people to
through a nozzle. The product of blades, most of the steam’s was 1892 before it was good help cyclists, with his “crypto-
was highly flammable, but both energy would be wasted, but in enough to sell. dynamic” gearing of 1885.
inventors found a way of 1884 British engineer Charles Then, in 1902, British engineers
converting it back into safer (later Sir Charles) Parsons Bicycle Henry Sturmey and James
cellulose. Chardonnet got a invented a turbine with many Archer both invented similar
patent for his process in 1884, sets of blades on one shaft. 1885 gears. These were brought
and by 1891 had set up a These were graded in size to together by bicycle maker
factory at Besançon to make capture most of the steam’s John Starley Frank (later Sir Frank) Bowden.
artificial silk commercially. energy. Turbines like this are Like earlier designs, the
now used everywhere to power Many inventors worked on Sturmey-Archer gear was housed
Motorcycle ships and electric generators. bicycles in the 1870s and inside the bike’s rear hub.
80s. But the first design that
1884 Adder-lister looked like a modern bike was

Edward Butler, 1885 made by British engineer
Gottlieb Daimler John Starley in 1885.
William Burroughs Several makers had
The first motorcycle already produced chain-
had three wheels. It was The first adding machine driven “safety bicycles”,
designed by British engineer that printed its calculations but Starley was the first
Edward Butler in 1884, was created by a US inventor to make both wheels
although he didn’t build it who left school at 15. It took
until 1887. Its engine was at William Burroughs four years about the same size, put
the back and drove a single to produce his first machine, them in a diamond-shaped
rear wheel. In 1885, German frame, and slope the front
engineer Gottlieb Daimler which he completed in forks to the correct angle
designed the first to make the wheel go in a
two-wheeled straight line. His machine’s
motorcycle. He name, the Rover, lives on in the
built it purely Range Rover and Land Rover.
because he
wanted to test
a new high-
speed gas

Motorcycle The Holden
motorcycle, patented in 1897, had four
cylinders driving the back wheel directly.

1884 The first women’s Tennis Club, Wimbledon, which 1884 US writer Mark sequel to his highly successful
singles tennis was founded in 1877. Maud Twain writes his The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,
championship is held at the Watson claimed the title from most popular book, Huckleberry uses vivid language and humour
All England Croquet and Lawn Lilian Watson 6-8, 6-3, 6-3. Finn. This children’s novel, a
to deal with violence and racism.
156

Gas mantle engineer Émile Levassor who followed instructions created 1851 – 1900
produced the first car with its by the keyboard, delivering
1885 engine at the front, driving the type almost ready to print. Wilhelm Maybach had designed
rear wheels through a clutch Monotype dominated book an effective carburetor. They
Carl Auer von Welsbach and gearbox. His 1891 model printing for more than 70 years. used it in a new high-speed
was the forerunner of the cars engine, which was the first
In the late 19th century, we drive today. Gasoline engine true gasoline engine and the
many people used gas lamps. forerunner of those that power
Electric lighting could have Monotype 1885 most cars today.
swept these away, but in 1885, typesetting
Austrian chemist Carl Auer Gottlieb Daimler, Rabies vaccine
von Welsbach discovered how system Wilhelm Maybach
to get more light from gas. 1885
He found that salts of thorium 1885 The gasoline engine evolved
and cerium gave out an intense from engines that ran on Louis Pasteur
light when deposited on Tolbert Lanston natural gas. These could not
asbestos fibers and heated. run on liquid fuel, so the Rabies is an infection of the
By the 1890s, gas lamps were One of the slowest operations carburetor, which turns nervous system, which
wearing little knitted covers in traditional printing was gasoline into a mist and mixes people can catch from animal
known as mantles over their setting up type. By the 1880s it with air, was an essential bites, and usually kills if not
flames. When a lamp was lit, several inventors were trying component of a gasoline caught in time. The French
the metals in its mantle gave to mechanize the process. engine. By 1885, German biologist Louis Pasteur
out enough light to rival an First to succeed was US engineers Gottlieb Daimler and developed the first vaccine
electric bulb. inventor Tolbert Lanston. against rabies by heating tissue
His Monotype system from infected animals to create
Car of 1885 had a keyboard a weakened virus. On 6 July,
and a machine for
1885 casting type from molten 1885, he gave a dramatic
metal. The caster demonstration of
Karl Benz, its power by
Gottlieb Daimler, vaccinating a boy
who had been bitten
Émile Levassor
by a dog with rabies.
The first car, the The boy lived.
Motorwagen, was
built in 1885 by
German engineer Karl
Benz. It was a three-
wheeler with a single-
cylinder engine. Soon
Benz and others
were making four-
wheeled cars. In
1889, Gottlieb
Daimler produced
one with four gears.
But it was French

Steering
column and

indicator
Chain drive to
the wheels

Car This Benz car, made in 1888,
was sold by Emile Roger, Benz’s agent
in Paris. It had a tubular metal frame,
like a bicycle, and bodywork based on
horse-drawn vehicles. The engine was
at the rear, below the driver’s seat.

1884 The London Society law. Later, it will link with other 1884 The world system of to consider proposals about time
for the Prevention of societies to form the National standard time zones zones made in the 1870s by
Cruelty to Children is founded Society for the Prevention of is established. Delegates from 27 Canadian railroad planner and
following the passing of a cruelty Cruelty to Children (NSPCC). nations meet in Washington D.C. engineer Sir Sandford Fleming.

157

SkyScraper The steel Skyscraper dissolved aluminum oxide in Moving the head moves the
The Empire mast was molten cryolite (sodium tubes, but the liquid inside
State Building designed as 1885 aluminum fluoride) and used lags behind. Hairs in the tubes
in New York a mooring electricity to drag the detect the relative movement
City is mast for William Jenney aluminum and oxygen apart. and tell the brain which way
perhaps the airships The Hall-Héroult process has the head is moving.
most famous Although tall buildings transformed aluminum from an
skyscraper. can be built with brick exotic curiosity to the stuff of Linotype
Completed in or stone, real skyscrapers need jumbo jets and soda cans. typesetting
1931, it has a steel frame. The first such
102 floors. building was designed by US Recording machine
engineer William Jenney in on wax
1884. Built in Chicago, it was 1886
completed in 1885 and was 1886
10 storys high. Its steel frame Ottmar Mergenthaler
took much of the weight of Chichester Bell,
its stone walls. By the 1930s, Charles Tainter Until the 1970s, most
this idea had been extended to newspapers were set in
produce walls hung from the The first sound recordings type using a machine invented
frame, called curtain walls. were made on foil wrapped by German-US engineer Ottmar
around a grooved cylinder. A Mergenthaler in 1886. The
Coca-Cola needle, moving up and down, Linotype machine used molten
created “hills and dales” in metal, but instead of making
1886 the shape of the sound waves. individual letters like the
These recordings were fragile Monotype machine (✷ see
John Pemberton and inaccurate. In 1886, US page 157), it produced whole
inventors Chichester Bell and lines of type – hence the name.
In 1886, pharmacist John Charles Tainter patented a Newspaper printers liked it
Pemberton of Atlanta, machine called the because it was quick to use and
Georgia, invented a new drink. Graphophone, which recorded needed only one operator.
Its ingredients included cocaine on waxed cardboard cylinders.
from coca plants and caffeine The wax, together with a Steam
from kola nuts, so he called it recording stylus that made a sterilization
Coca-Cola. (The cocaine was v-shaped groove, gave better of surgical
left out from 1903 onwards). sound. They were soon in use instruments
When Pemberton put the drink for all recordings.
into local shops, it became 1886
wildly popular. By 1892, the Function of
Coca-Cola Company was born. the ear’s Ernst von Bergmann

Inexpensive semicircular Once surgeons realized that
aluminium canals infections were caused by
germs (✷ see page 146), they
1886 1886 had to decide what to do
about them. Should they kill
Charles Hall, Marie Flourens, them with antiseptics or try to
Paul Héroult Yves Delage keep them out of the operating
room from the start? Today, the
Aluminium is the most The semicircular canals of second approach is normal
common metal on the inner ear are three practice. It was pioneered by
Earth, but was once too fluid-filled tubes joined German surgeon Ernst von
expensive to use. It is together at right angles. In Bergmann in 1886. He was
found as aluminum oxide, 1824, French biologist Marie the first person to sterilize
Flourens noticed that pigeons instruments and dressings with
whose oxygen cannot moved strangely after a tube steam. He later made everything
easily be removed was cut. In 1886, another else used in operations as
by chemical French biologist, Yves Delage, germ-free as possible.
means. In 1886, realized what was happening.
both Charles Hall
in the US and Paul
Héroult in France

1886 French sculptor works, The Kiss. Originally placed 1886 US president Grover a gift from the people of France.
Auguste Rodin in a set of doors called The Gates Cleveland accepts Marking the centenary of US
creates the first version of what of Hell, it is based on a scene one of the world’s most famous independence, it stands
will be one of his best known from Dante’s Divine Comedy. symbols, the Statue of Liberty, as 306 ft 8 in (93.5 m) high.

158

Comptometer problem by inventing a meets sea. The first fractal 1851 – 1900
universal language. The only curves were described by
1887 one that has had any success Italian mathematician Giuseppe Gramophone
is Esperanto, invented in 1887 Peano, in 1887. They were
Dorr E. Felt by Polish oculist Ludwik viewed as a mere curiosity 1887
Zamenhof. Based on European until the 1970s, when Polish
The Comptometer was one languages, it has simple, mathematician Benoit Emile Berliner
of two calculating machines regular rules. Some of these Mandelbrot investigated
used in accounting offices from seem strange to English- them in more detail. The first recording machines
the late 19th to the mid 20th speakers: plural nouns demand He used them to made cylindrical records.
century. While its rival, the plural adjectives, for instance. create some In 1887, German engineer
Burroughs machine (✷ see Despite this, more than stunning Emile Berliner,
page 156), could produce 100,000 people can speak it. computer working in the USA,
a printed record, the graphics. came up with a
Comptometer was faster. Fractal curve better idea –
Invented by US engineer Dorr Horn channelled discs. He
E. Felt, it was first used in 1887 the sounds from coated metal
1887. As with the Burroughs the disc with wax,
machine, numbers were Giuseppe Peano recorded
entered using columns of keys sound by
– one for units, one for tens, Afractal curve is a cutting
and so on. The result was wiggly line that looks through the
displayed in a set of windows the same however much it is wax, then etched
for clerks to copy out by hand. magnified. An example is the metal to make a
the coast of a country, permanent record. The cutter
Esperanto which looks just as moved from side to side, not
wiggly on a small- up and down as in earlier
1887 scale map as on machines. On playback, the
the actual shore needle followed this “lateral-
Ludwik Zamenhof where sand cut” groove more faithfully,
giving better reproduction.
International cooperation is More importantly, discs could
hampered by the fact that
people in different countries be stamped out
speak different languages. Many by the thousand,
people have tried to solve this making Berliner’s
Gramophone the
best choice for
music lovers.

Drive belt Handle was
used to keep
Disc was Steel needle the turntable
played on a was lowered moving round
onto the disc
turntable Gramophone Early Berliner
gramophones had no motor, so
1886 Scottish writer about a doctor who can turn 1887 Two more classic listeners had to turn a handle. The
Robert Louis into a fiend. A “Jekyll and Hyde” fictional characters discs were the same size as a CD,
Stevenson publishes The Strange will come to mean anyone with are born when Scottish writer but played for only about a minute.
Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, two sides to their character. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle writes
A Study in Scarlet featuring ace
detective Sherlock Holmes and
his friend Dr. Watson. The story
will be followed by many others.

159

Science takeS control Steam tricycle had to process their own
pictures. US businessman
Mail order The Sears, Roebuck 1887 George Eastman changed that
catalog became a part of the with his Kodak camera. It was
American way of life, allowing Leon Serpollet simple to use and came already
people in rural areas to enjoy the loaded with film. After use, the
fruits of the nation’s prosperity. At one time it looked as camera went back to Eastman,
though steam, not who returned it, reloaded,
Mail order gasoline, might be best for along with the pictures. With
motor vehicles. Several his slogan “You press the
1887 inventors designed steam button, we do the rest,”
tricycles in the 1880s. In 1887, Eastman became a rich man.
Richard Sears, French engineer Leon Serpollet
Alvah Roebuck overcame their chief problem Radio waves
with a boiler that produced
Richard Sears thought up instant steam. He built this into 1888
mail order while working a tricycle, then showed it off by
for a US railroad company. driving it 282 miles (451 km) James Clerk Maxwell,
Acquiring some unwanted from Paris to Lyon. Later, he Heinrich Hertz
watches, he sold them by mail built steam cars. In 1903, one
to other railroad workers. He reached 80 mph (130 km/h). In 1864, Scottish physicist
used the profits to set up a James Clerk Maxwell
company, which by 1887 had Pneumatic tire predicted the existence of
produced the first mail-order electromagnetic waves moving
catalog. He later formed a new 1888 at the speed of light. German
company with repairman physicist Heinrich Hertz
Alvah Roebuck. By 1894, the Robert Thomson, wanted to generate such waves
Sears, Roebuck catalog was John Dunlop and see if they behaved like
507 pages thick.
B ritish inventor Robert
Thomson patented air-filled
leather tires in 1845, but these
were never as popular as solid
rubber ones. The first
High-voltage successful pneumatic tire
power was patented in 1888
by Scottish vet John
transmission Dunlop, after he
experimented with
1887 Earpiece was
hung on a
Sebastian de Ferranti rubber tubing on hook to
the wheels of his
In the 1880s there were many son’s tricycle. The disconnect
rival electricity systems. But finished product the phone
British engineer Sebastian de
Ferranti could see the future. was protected by
Electricity would be generated a canvas cover.
in big power stations outside Dunlop’s tire was
cities, not little ones inside ideal for bicycles,
them, and transmitted at high and later became Wire connected
voltage. In 1887, he designed a essential for cars. the earpiece to
giant power station at Deptford,
just outside London, and cables the phone
that could take 10,000 volts.
The station’s directors pushed Kodak
him out in 1891, and it was
not completed to his plan. But camera
Ferranti was right: high-voltage
transmission is universal today. 1888

George Eastman autoMatic telephone
exchange This 1905 phone was
Until 1888, photography designed for use with a Strowger
was difficult. Cameras exchange. Automatic dialling was
were complicated, and users available for local calls only.

1888 Dutch painter Gauguin in the south of France. 1889 A baby is born in surname, earlier changed from
Vincent van Gogh He cuts off part of his left ear and the town of Branau, Schicklgruber, is Hitler. The baby
cracks under the strain of living later paints a portrait of himself 30 miles (50 km) north of is named Adolf. Fifty years on, he
with French painter Paul with his head bandaged. Salzburg, Austria. His father’s will plunge the world into war.

160

light, to find out if light itself Automatic Strowger, fed up with his 1851 – 1900
was electromagnetic. He found telephone operator diverting calls to
that electrical sparks produced exchange a rival, devised the first Tabulating
waves that could be received successful automatic telephone machine
on a distant loop of wire, 1889 switch. Callers could control
producing more sparks. He had it from their own phone by 1889
discovered radio waves. Further Almon B. Strowger sending groups of electrical
experiments showed that they pulses down the line. The first Herman Hollerith
did behave much like light. Telephone exchanges automatic exchange opened
Satisfied with these discoveries, are needed to connect at La Porte, Indiana, in 1892. As the population of the US
complete by 1888, Hertz made phones to each other. At first, At first, callers generated the grew, classifying the people
no further use of them. connections were made by control pulses by repeatedly took longer. Engineer Herman
operators pushing plugs into pushing a button. Later, the Hollerith decided to mechanize
sockets. Then, in 1889, Kansas more convenient rotary dial the 1890 census. Citizens were
City funeral director Almon B. mechanism made this process recorded as holes punched in a
automatic too. (See also card. Hollerith’s “tabulating”
Getting connected.) machines then sorted and
counted the cards at high speed.

GETTING CONNECTED

Telephones would noT work without exchanges. Your phone would have to
be permanently connected to every other phone in the world, just in case you
wanted to call it. In reality, connections are set up only when they are needed,

by routing a call through a number of switches that connect you first to the
exchange that handles the phone you want, then to that particular phone.

An operator on a telephone exchange board connects callers to the number they ask for.

Calling the operator Strowger’S SyStem
Before automatic exchanges, all calls were Strowger’s basic idea was a remote-
connected by operators. To make a call, controlled switch that could connect one
you would lift the receiver and, on some phone to any of several others. It was
systems, alert the operator by turning a operated by electric pulses from the user’s
handle. You would then ask for the telephone line. Electromagnets and ratchets
number you wanted and the operator moved a connector to one of 10 rows of
would make the connection by contacts, then along the selected row to
plugging your line into a switchboard. reach the exact phone required.

1889 French engineer other entries in a competition, 1889 In November, Phileas Fogg and travel around
Gustave Eiffel builds pushing technology to its limits. US investigative the world in less than 80 days.
a spectacular iron tower for the Not everyone likes it, but it will journalist Nellie Bly sets out to She does it in 72 days, 6 hours,
Paris World’s Fair. It beats 100 become the emblem of Paris. beat Jules Verne’s fictional hero 11 minutes, and 14 seconds.

161

Science takeS control routine immunization with Gaslight baffled until British telegraph
tetanus vaccine. If they suffer a photographic engineer Oliver Heaviside
Halftone screen deep, dirty cut, they will need invented a new mathematical
only a booster dose to ensure paper method that showed where the
1890 continued protection. problem lay. He published his
1891 results in 1892, and in 1900
Max Levy, Louis Levy Steam-powered US physicist Michael Pupin
airplane Leo Baekeland used them to improve long-
Black-and-white photos, distance lines by adding special
with all their tones of gray, 1890 In the 1880s, photographers coils at regular intervals.
are printed by the halftone made prints by daylight. This
process. This turns them into Clèment Ader restricted their hours of work. Vacuum bottle
dots – large ones in dark areas, The first photographic paper
small ones in paler areas. In the French engineer Clèment that worked in artificial light – 1892
original process, the dots were Ader was very nearly the usually gaslight – was invented
made by copying the photo first person to fly a plane. His by Belgian-US chemist Leo James Dewar
with a camera that had a screen steam-powered aircraft, the Baekeland in 1891. He sold his
carrying crisscross lines just Eole, managed a longer flight Velox paper to George Eastman Scottish physicist
in front of the film. The first than the more famous Wright in 1898, helping to make James (later Sir
successful halftone screen was brothers (✷ see page 175), but photography affordable for all. James) Dewar was one
made in 1890 by US inventors it didn’t quite count. On of the first to make
Max and Louis Levy. They October 9, 1890, Ader managed Long-distance oxygen so cold that it
cemented together two sheets a 160 ft (50 m) “flight” near telephone turned into a liquid.
of glass, each ruled with Paris, but the machine wasn’t cable But he had storage
straight lines. Screens like this really flying because it wasn’t problems, because at
were in use until the 1970s. under control. The experiment 1892 –183°C oxygen turns
proved that a steam engine was back to gas. So he
Tetanus just too heavy for flight. Oliver Heaviside, invented a special
immunization Michael Pupin bottle, the Dewar flask.
Surgical gloves It was made of two
1890 Early long-distance layers of glass, silvered
1890 telephone calls suffered like a mirror and with a
Emil Behring, from blurring and distortion, vacuum between them.
Kitasato Shibasaburo William Halsted an effect already noticed on Infrared radiation, or
telegraph cables. It could radiant heat, was
Tetanus, or lockjaw, is an By the 1880s, many surgeons make it impossible to reflected from the
infection caused by germs were convinced that germs understand what silvering, while the
in soil. These can breed inside were a threat to their patients. someone was saying.
a cut, producing poisons that Sterilization and antiseptics Scientists were vacuum stopped
make muscles contract and heat from being
may cause death. In 1890, could help, but what about carried in
German and Japanese the surgeon’s hands? They through air
bacteriologists Emil were a source of infection, currents.
Behring and Kitasato even when scrubbed, but
Shibasaburo found could not be replaced by
they could protect instruments. US surgeon
animals from William Halsted found
tetanus by the answer in 1890:
injecting serum he invented the thin
from another rubber gloves that all
infected animal. surgeons wear today.
Today, most
people in the Double walls greatly
West receive reduce heat transfer

tetanus by air currents

immunization Vacuum bottle Dewar flasks
can be made of metal as well as glass.
Tetanus vaccine, or This model of a metal flask has been cut
toxoid, contains the open to reveal its double wall. Metal flasks
poison produced by are not easy to make, but have the advantage of

tetanus germs, being stronger and safer than glass flasks.
made safe by heat

or chemicals.

1890 Norwegian dramatist Hedda Gabler. Ignoring the 1891 New York City opens Tchaikowsky is guest conductor
Henrik Ibsen conventions of 19th-century a new concert hall, during its first week. Most
challenges accepted attitudes to financed by industrialist Andrew important American and visiting
women with his realistic play drama, Ibsen creates a powerful Carnegie. Russian composer musicians will perform here.

new form of theater.

162

viscose rayon This material 1851 – 1900
has a glamorous, glossy finish. By Moving picture Using a
1903, when these samples were Kinetoscope was nothing like
made, it was beginning to rival going to the movies. Peering
natural silk.
through the eyepiece, the
viewer saw a moving image
that lasted about as long as

a modern TV commercial.

Viscose rayon Beijerinck did Film passed
similar work in through in a
1892 1898. Both continuous loop
discovered that
Charles Cross, viruses were far
Edward Bevan, smaller than
Clayton Beadle bacteria and
invisible under
The first artificial silk was an ordinary
expensive because it was microscope.
made by a slow, dangerous
method (✷ see page 156). In Moving
1892, three British chemists, picture
Charles Cross, Edward Bevan,
and Clayton Beadle, invented 1893
the viscose process. Cellulose is
converted into nonflammable William Dickson,
cellulose xanthate and dissolved Thomas Edison
in caustic soda to form a
yellow, sticky liquid. This is It is not clear
squirted through nozzles and who invented
reacts with further chemicals movies. A young
to make a silky artificial fiber US engineer,
called viscose rayon. William Dickson,
who worked for
Viruses Thomas Edison,
has a good claim.
1892 Edison thought
that phonograph
Dmitry Ivanovsky, listeners might like
Martinus Beijerinck something to watch,
and asked Dickson
Avirus is an infectious to provide it.
particle that can multiply Dickson devised
only inside a living cell. It is a machine, the
basically just a set of genes Kinetograph, which
wrapped in a protective took 40 pictures
coating. It takes over a plant or each second on
animal cell, forcing it to make a long strip of
copies of the invader. The first film. The film
scientist to realize that bacteria was then viewed,
were not the only infective by one person at a time,
agents was Russian micro- in another machine, the
biologist Dmitry Ivanovsky. He Kinetoscope. It held only
published a paper on a virus 50 ft (15 m) of film, so a
infection of tobacco plants in movie lasted only 20 seconds.
1892. Dutch botanist Martinus

1892 In the US, a five- in Homestead, Pennsylvania, 1893 Norwegian painter anxiety and emotional torment.
month struggle after workers’ wages are cut. Edvard Munch It will become one of the most
between a big trade union and The strike ends violently with famous examples of the style
bosses of the steel industry starts several deaths. produces The Scream, a painting known as expressionism.
that conveys intense feelings of
163

Science takeS control way most words got printed. unknown, heavier gas. They Helium on
Computers now store letter both found it in 1894. Its name Earth
Zipper shapes in digital form. So, like “argon” is Greek for “inactive”.
metal type, phototypesetting 1895
1893 itself is now a thing of the past. Movies
William Ramsay
Whitcomb Judson, Radio 1895
Gideon Sundback communication Helium, the gas that
Auguste Lumière, is used to fill party
Chicago engineer Whitcomb 1894 Louis Lumière balloons, was first found on
Judson got tired of lacing Earth by William Ramsay in
his boots, and invented a Guglielmo Marconi Movies did not become a 1895. He heated a mineral
fastener that hooked them up truly theatrical experience called cleveite, which contains
with one pull. He patented it in Italian inventor Guglielmo until French brothers Auguste uranium, and discovered that
1893, but it tended to come Marconi started and Louis Lumière invented it gave off a gas. The gas’s
unhooked. Swedish engineer experimenting with radio the Cinématographe, the first spectrum contained a yellow
Gideon Sundback realized that waves in 1894, when he was system that could show an line matching that of helium
the hooks were the problem. only 19. Others, such as the audience a moving picture in the Sun, which proved its
By 1914 he had developed the British and Russian physicists that ran for several minutes. identity. Swedish chemists
modern fastener, with cups, not Oliver Lodge and Alexander Their machine acted as both Nils Langlet and Per Cleve
hooks, locking together. It was Popov, did the same. But it camera and projector. It gave also found the gas at about
used in 1923 for a boot called was Marconi who really got its first public performance on the same time. Later, Ramsay
the Zipper, and the name stuck. radio going. Within a year December 28, 1895, in Paris. and British chemist Frederick
he was sending signals The program of 12 short Soddy discovered that helium
Bubonic 1.25 miles (2 km). By 1896 films, including one showing is produced whenever
plague agent he was in Britain and had the radioactive elements decay.
world’s first radio patent. Lumière factory workers,
1894 After much further caused a sensation.
development, it was
Kitasato Shibasaburo, Marconi’s “wireless
Alexandre Yersin telegraph” that sent the
distress signals from the
Bubonic plague is a deadly sinking ship Titanic in 1912.
disease carried by rat fleas.
It has killed millions in Argon
repeated epidemics. Thanks
to the discoveries of Japanese 1894
and Swiss bacteriologists
Kitasato Shibasaburo and Lord Rayleigh,
Alexandre Yersin in 1894, we William Ramsay
now know that it is caused
by a type of germ known as Argon is
a bacillus. It is usually called known
Yersinia pestis in honor of as an inert gas
Yersin’s contribution. because it does
not react
Phototypesetting chemically. It is
used in lightbulbs because
1894 it makes the filament
last longer. It was
Eugene Porzolt discovered by British
physicist Lord Rayleigh,
Photography offers an who noticed that nitrogen
alternative to metal type. from air was denser than
Letters can be projected on to nitrogen from chemicals.
film. The first phototypesetting Both he and British chemist
machine, designed in 1894 William (later Sir William)
by Hungarian engineer Eugene Ramsay thought that
Porzolt, was a failure. But from atmospheric nitrogen might
the 1960s, with computers be contaminated with an
controlling the process,
phototypesetting became the

1893 On December 23, Humperdinck’s tuneful opera 1894london’s Tower Barry, and powered by steam, it
Richard Strauss Hansel and Gretel. The story, by Bridge, started in is London’s only moving bridge.
conducts the first performance of Humperdinck’s sister Adelheid, is 1886, finally opens. Built by Sir Its twin towers will become a
German composer Engelbert Horace Jones and Sir John Wolfe well known symbol of the city.
based on a well known folk tale.
164

Liquid air His system, invented in 1895, X-rays 1851 – 1900
produced a continuous stream tube was shielded so that no
1895 of liquid air. He later distilled 1895 light could escape from it. He
air to produce liquid nitrogen, worked out that the cathode
Carl von Linde used as a coolant, and liquid Wilhelm Röntgen rays, hitting the glass of the
oxygen, used in tube, were producing other
If air is made cold enough, it steel making. German physicist rays that made the crystals
turns into a liquid. The drop Wilhelm Röntgen glow. He did some further
in temperature is produced by discovered X-rays in experiments, which showed
compressing air, letting it cool, 1895 while he was that the rays could pass
then letting it expand so that it investigating cathode through solid objects and
cools still further. The first to rays (electrical affect photographic plates.
do this on a discharges inside This led him to make the first
large scale a tube containing ever X-ray picture. At first,
was German very little air). Röntgen was not sure that he
engineer He noticed that should announce his discovery.
Carl von when the tube He was worried that other
Linde. was working, some scientists might not believe
crystals lying nearby him. But soon everyone was
glowed, even though the talking about the new rays that
made hidden things visible.

Wheel
guided the
film into the
mechanism

Rotating shutter Lenses for red, X-rays Small animals like this Radiation from
has red, green, and green, and rat made good subjects for early uranium
blue images experimenters with X-rays. For
blue apertures to Handle was 1896
give the film color turned to the first time, their skeletons
show the could be seen without dissection. Henri Becquerel
Movies The early film
movie camera (left) Film wound French physicist Henri
was hand-cranked. onto a spool Becquerel wanted to
The projector see if crystals that glowed after
(right) could exposure to sunlight gave out
show films X-rays. In 1896, he found that
in color. certain uranium salts affected a
wrapped-up photographic plate
when placed on it in sunlight.
Becquerel thought that sunlight
may have made the crystals
produce X-rays, which went
through the wrapping. Then he
discovered that the experiment
worked in the dark. The
crystals gave out penetrating
radiation all by themselves.

1895 In April, the song for the first time. Its title means 1896 The ancient Greek nations take part in the all-male
Waltzing Matilda, by “carrying a bag of belongings, or Olympic Games are competition. It includes a new
“Banjo” Paterson, is performed in swag”, and it tells the story of a revived in Athens by Pierre Fredi, event, the marathon, which is
wandering laborer, or swagman. Baron de Coubertin. Fourteen won by a Greek shepherd.
Winton, Queensland, Australia,

165

Science takeS control Sphygmomano- Doctors now listen to the flow
meter with a stethoscope, a
Surgical mask refinement added in 1905 by
1896 Russian surgeon N. S. Korotkoff.
1896 This allows them to measure
Scipione Riva-Rocci the minimum pressure as well.
Johannes von
Mikulicz-Radecki The usual instrument for sphygmomano-
measuring blood pressure, meTer This 1905
With sterilization of the sphygmomanometer, was instrument is similar
instruments, and surgical invented in 1896 by Scipione to those used today.
gloves in frequent use, one of Riva-Rocci, an Italian children’s The rubber bulb
the last sources of infection in doctor. A cuff around pumps air into the
the operating room was the the arm is inflated until arm cuff.
surgeon’s own breath. In 1896, the blood stops flowing.
a gifted Polish surgeon working The air pressure is then
in Germany, Johannes von reduced until the flow
Mikulicz-Radecki, blocked up just starts again,
this loophole by placing gauze indicating the
over his mouth to form the maximum
first surgical mask. blood pressure.

Toothpaste Blood pressure
in a tube reading taken

1896 from here

William Colgate Cathode ray Exhaust casing
oscilloscope received the
Toothpaste existed in spent steam
the 19th century, but 1897
was packaged in jars. The experimental cathode ray tube
first person to put it in a tube Ferdinand Braun (a glass tube containing very
was US dentist Washington little air, in which a negative
Sheffield. His Creme Dentifrice Electric waves are electrode, or cathode, gives off
of 1892 was not very invisible, so the cathode electric particles) and added
popular and it was ray oscilloscope, which magnetic coils to move the
eclipsed four years displays electrical particles horizontally and
later with the signals on a screen, is vertically in response to signals.
marketing of a valuable tool. It was In this way Braun managed to
Colgate Ribbon invented in 1897 by draw patterns on a screen
Dental Cream by German physicist inside the tube.
New York soap and Ferdinand Braun.
candle maker William Colgate. He took the still- Diesel engine
He changed the shape of the
tube nozzle, and described the 1897
result with the successful
slogan “Comes out a ribbon,
lies flat on the brush.”

TooThpasTe in a Tube People who Rudolf Diesel
were accustomed to toothpaste from a jar
seem to have had trouble with it when it came In 1892, German engineer
out of a tube, but Colgate’s toothpaste behaved itself. Rudolf Diesel patented an
engine that gave more power
for less fuel. It compressed its
fuel and air to a much higher
pressure than a gasoline
engine, making it so hot that
it burned without the aid of
a spark. In 1897, he built a
fully developed engine, which

1896 Popular British features such as a women’s 1897 Vampires get a boost ancient Slavic religious belief that
newspaper the Daily column, competitions, and from British writer a buried body that does not
Mail is founded by media tycoon stories, and will soon change the decompose will leave its grave at
Alfred Harmsworth. It includes nature of newspaper publishing. Bram Stoker’s horror novel night to drink human blood.
Dracula. He bases it on the
166

1851 – 1900

Turbine ship The original steam turbine in the Turbinia was an Turbine ship
extremely advanced piece of engineering for the end of the 19th
century, and still looks impressive today. Parsons’ engine was a more 1897
compact and efficient powerplant than the older piston engine.

Blades turned High-pressure Thrust block Charles Parsons
by low- steam entered transmitted
pressure turbine here push of Steamships changed forever
steam propeller to when British engineer
the ship Charles (later Sir
Charles) Parsons
launched

Outer casing cut away Shaft turned the Turbinia, the first ship powered
to show turbine blades ship’s propeller by his steam turbine. In 1897,
he demonstrated it to the
Blades turned by Blades turned by Royal Navy near Portsmouth,
medium-pressure steam high-pressure steam England. Navy ships were
powered by piston engines,
delivered 25 horsepower from a and could move faster than any the first multiple-unit electric and Turbinia made them look
single cylinder. Diesel engines atom, and realized that he had train. It was introduced on the ridiculous as it darted among
can be expensive, heavy, and found something new. We now Chicago South Side Elevated them at the record speed of
noisy, but are unbeatable where call the particles electrons. Railway in 1898, and was later 34 knots (43 mph or 69 km/h).
fuel consumption really counts. used on New York’s Manhattan Tests in other ships confirmed
Multiple-unit Elevated Railway. the turbine’s superiority.
Electron electric train
Transmission of Conditioned
1897 1897 malaria by reflex
mosquito
J. J. Thomson Frank Sprague 1898
1897
British physicist J. J. (later Instead of one powerful Ivan Pavlov
Sir J. J.) Thomson was the locomotive at the front, many Ronald Ross
first person to show that atoms electric trains have smaller Areflex is an automatic
contain smaller particles. He driving motors at several points Malaria is a disease caused response, such as pulling
studied cathode rays and, by along their length. This gives by tiny parasites living in a hand away from a hot object.
subjecting the rays to electric better acceleration and more the blood. Patients suffer In 1898, Russian scientist Ivan
and magnetic fields, he showed passenger space, but the recurrent chills and sweats. Pavlov started experiments that
in 1897 that they consisted of motors have to work together Nobody knew how the led him to discover a more
negatively charged particles. so that all the coaches speed parasites got there until British complicated kind of reflex.
Thomson discovered that it up and slow down at the same bacteriologist Ronald (later Sir When investigating digestion in
made no difference what rate. In 1897, US engineer Ronald) Ross studied infected dogs, he found that the sound
materials he used, and he Frank Sprague managed to birds in India. He proved in of food being prepared made
concluded that the particles control separate motors in 1897 that the parasites are their mouths water. He later
existed in everything. He this way, and used them in carried by mosquitoes and found he could train them to
believed that they were lighter injected when they bite. salivate whenever a bell was
A year later three Italian sounded. Pavlov called this
scientists showed that only kind of reflex conditional,
one mosquito, the Anopheles, because it only happened after
gives malaria to humans. learning, but it is now usually
called a conditioned reflex.

1897 The world’s first over 42 km (26 miles). It will be 1898 Canadian adventurer first person to sail around the
mass marathon is repeated every April, but women Joshua Slocum world single-handed. He set out
run in the US from Hopkinton, will not be allowed to compete reaches Newport on the US’ from Boston in a 95-year-old boat
Massachusetts, to Boston – just for another 75 years. northeast coast to become the more than three years earlier.

167

Science takeS control Radium was first made by German rigid Airship Airships like this
chemist Felix Hoffman, whose were used by the Royal Naval Air
Magnetic 1898 father may have taken the acid Service in World War I.
recording for rheumatism. The compound
Marie Curie, Pierre Curie was first marketed by the Fingerprinting
1898 German company Bayer
See pages 170–171 for the in 1899. 1900
Valdemar Poulsen story of how Marie and
Pierre Curie discovered Rudder Cabin for Francis Galton,
Danish telephone engineer radium and made steered the the crew Edward Henry
Valdemar Poulsen was radiotherapy airship left was called
worried by one obvious defect possible. or right a gondola Fingerprints are a good way
of the telephone. Unlike the of tracking down criminals,
telegraph, it didn’t work Paper-clip Escalator but they only work because
without someone there to there is a way of classifying
answer it. So in 1898 he 1899 1900 them. Without this, a new
invented the first print could not be compared
telephone answering William Middlebrook George Wheeler, with those on record. British
machine, the Charles Seeberger scientist Francis (later Sir
Telegraphone. To do The most common kind of Francis) Galton, having
so, he had to invent a paper-clip seems to have The first escalator, invented confirmed that every
totally new technology – come from nowhere. It is known by US engineer Jesse Reno, fingerprint is different,
magnetic recording. His as the Gem clip, and may have was just a sloping, moving devised a basic classification
machine recorded telephone been made first by an English walkway with a grooved tread system. Police officer Edward
messages on a reel of thin steel company called Gem. One to stop passengers from (later Sir Edward) Henry
wire, and could also be used inventor who was involved, US slipping. It wasn’t even called developed this into the system
for dictation. (✷ See also engineer William Middlebrook, an escalator. This name was widely used today. It was
Recording with magnetism.) patented a paper-clip-making used by US engineer Charles published in 1900. Two years
machine in 1899. The patent Seeberger to describe a design later, fingerprints made their
Polonium drawings show it making a Gem. with folding steps originally first appearance in court.
invented by George Wheeler.
1898 Aspirin Seeberger joined the Otis
Elevator Company, which
Marie Curie, Pierre Curie 1899 exhibited the escalator at the
1900 Paris Exposition. Later,
Polonium is a very rare Felix Hoffman the company added the
element. Highly radioactive, grooved tread from Reno’s
it can be used to discharge Other drugs have design to complete the
unwanted static electricity. partly replaced escalator we know today.
The best source is pitchblende, aspirin as a painkiller,
but 1,100 tons (1,000 tonnes) but it is still used for
of this yield only 40 mg of treating strokes and heart
polonium. Polonium was the attacks. Chemically related to a
first element to be revealed by plant extract, salicylic acid, it
its radioactivity, and it was
discovered by radioactivity
pioneers Marie and Pierre
Curie in 1898. They called it
polonium after Marie’s native
country, Poland.

Aspirin Soluble
aspirin from Bayer is seen here
in its original packaging.

1899 What will become Missouri by US composer and 1899 Three years of war by Paul Kruger, start fighting
one of the most pianist Scott Joplin. A later begin in South Africa with the British. Resentment had
played piano pieces of all time, attempt by Joplin to break into when the Boers (descendants of built up over the huge influx of
Maple Leaf Rag, is published in opera will prove unsuccessful. the original Dutch settlers), led Britons seeking gold there.

168

Rigid frame gave 1851 – 1900
the airship a
smooth, sleek shape Rigid airship

1900

Nose was Ferdinand von Zeppelin
strengthened to take
The first airships were just
the mooring cable elongated balloons with
an engine and passenger
RECORDING WITH MAGNETISM compartment. In 1900,

German general Count
Ferdinand von Zeppelin built
the first airship with a rigid
frame. Its lifting gas was held
in separate gas bags inside
the frame, allowing a more
aerodynamic shape. Zeppelins,
as they became known, were
used as bombers in World
War I. After this they carried
passengers, until public
confidence was destroyed in
1937 when the Hindenburg
caught fire in a dramatic
accident, killing 35 passengers.

Propellers RecoRdings on wax weRe fRagile and quickly wore out.
moved the The alternative, magnetic recording, also had problems,
airship forwards including noise and distortion. Both were eventually
conquered. Magnetic recording proved ideal for
Quantum recording computer data and television pictures. Its
theory use with computers has more recently developed
into digital magnetic recording, which produces the
1900 near-perfect
tapes used to
Max Planck
make CDs.
In 1900, physicists had some
problems. One was that the Valdemar Poulsen, inventor Ampex VR1000 video recorder from about 1956
light from red-hot objects was of magnetic recording
not of the expected colour. Digital recorDing
German physicist Max Planck From metal to plastic Since about 1950, computers have used magnetic
found he could predict the Early magnetic recordings were made recording for storing data. Unlike sound, data can
color correctly by assuming on steel wire or tape. During World be recorded without errors. Sound converted into
that energy was radiated only War II, the first modern recorder, the digital form before recording gives a perfection
in multiples of a fixed amount, Magnetophon, was developed by AEG and unknown to the pioneers.
or quantum. This also BASF in Germany. Like all later machines,
explained why the energy of it used coated plastic tape.
electrons ejected from metals
by light depended on the ViDeo recorDing
color, not the brightness, of Video signals contain very high
the light. Over the next 30 frequencies. An ordinary recorder would
years, quantum theory allowed need to run very fast to record these.
Niels Bohr, Erwin Schrödinger, Video recorders, invented in 1956, have a
Werner Heisenberg, and others recording head that scans the tape at a high
to develop a new view of the enough speed to record these frequencies.
world in which matter and
energy could be both waves
and particles (✷ see page 190).
This has transformed physics.

1900 China sees the end society known as the Boxers. 1900 US tennis player tennis tournament for men. It
of a long campaign After a year of terrorism, Western Dwight F. Davis will become known as the Davis
against foreigners in the country, troops finally rescue besieged donates a cup to be awarded at Cup. Intended for amateurs, it
led by a secret martial arts foreigners from Beijing. an annual international lawn- will later become professional.

169

Science takeS control

partners in discovery

Marie and Pierre Curie discover radium and
make radiotherapy possible

In 1891, Marie Sklodowska arrived in Paris, aged 23. She had done
well in school in Poland and now, after eight years as a governess,
she had saved enough money for college. She registered at the

Sorbonne, the university in Paris, and became a student, studying

physical science and mathematics.

By 1894, Marie had her degree. Something else important

happened that year, too. She met Professor Pierre Curie, and in 1895

they got married, forming one of science’s most fruitful partnerships.

Marie decided to research the uranium radiation recently

discovered by Henri Becquerel. She studied pitchblende, a

Happy family Quadrant mineral containing uranium, and found that it produced
Marie and Pierre Curie were electrometer more radiation than the uranium alone could account for.
devoted to each other and their It clearly contained something more “radioactive,” as
children as well as to science. built by she called it, than uranium. With Pierre, she dissolved
They are seen here in 1904, Pierre pitchblende in chemicals to produce compounds they
two years before Pierre’s Curie could separate out. Work stopped briefly in 1897 for
tragic death, with their the birth of Marie’s first daughter.
daughter Irene, who Ionization
was then aged seven. chamber

In the summer of 1898, the Curies found a new

radioactive element, polonium, but there was more

radiation still unaccounted for. Its source must be

very radioactive indeed. Although they hadn’t

isolated it yet, they dubbed it radium,

announcing their discovery in December.

After another four years’ work, Marie had

produced just one-tenth of a gram of pure

radium chloride. She became a Doctor of

Glass flask used Ionization Science – the first woman in Europe
by Marie Curie chamber made to do so – and in 1903 shared the
by Pierre Curie Nobel prize for physics with Pierre and
Becquerel. As the first woman to win a
measuring radiation Nobel prize, Marie became famous. She
The Curies had to build most
of their research equipment and Pierre both got top jobs.
for themselves. Radiation can In 1904, the Curies
make air conduct electricity, had another
and Pierre developed several daughter. Then, in
highly sensitive measuring
instruments that made use
of this effect.

170

1851 – 1900

1906, tragedy struck. Pierre was hit by a Lasting fame
speeding cart and was killed. Marie had to By 1927, when this photograph
take over Pierre’s professorship at the was taken, Marie Curie had
Sorbonne – another first for a woman – and earned her place at the Solvay
continue the research by herself. With the Congress, a meeting of top
help of a colleague, she finally produced physicists held in Brussels,
pure radium in 1910. The following year she Belgium. She is sitting in the
received a second Nobel prize. This time, front row, third from the left.
there was nobody for her to share it with. Other famous names in the
group include Bohr, Bragg,
During World War I, Marie’s research took a back seat. After the war Einstein, Heisenberg, Lorentz,
she toured the world, using her fame to drum up support for a new use Pauli, Planck, and Schrödinger.
of her great discovery. Doctors had found that radium, the most powerful
source of radiation then known, could treat cancer. Marie Curie had
made radiotherapy possible. Although radium is now little used for this
purpose, it remains to remind us of a remarkable woman.

Extracting radium from pitchblende was a hard, tedious
grind. Working under primitive conditions, the Curies
had to treat several tons of the tarry, black rock with
chemicals to get just a few
milligrams of radium chloride.

test resuLts
The Curie Laboratory could
test gamma ray sources.
This certificate, signed by
Marie, verifies a source equal
to 10 mg of radium.

171

einvveenrtiyonos fnore

In the fIrst 50 years of the
20th century, new inventions
and discoveries transformed

both everyday life and the
world of science. Ordinary
people got radio, lifesaving
drugs, and cars. Scientists
created a new physics which
revealed the awesome energy
hidden in matter. The modern

world was nearly here.

172

Blood groups more interesting suspended 1901 – 1950
type, sometimes seen in
1901 amusement parks, has Brake disc
also been used for serious “caliper”
Karl Landsteiner transportation. The earliest housing
successful example, which pads
Early attempts at blood still survives, is the monorail
transfusion often killed that runs along the built the first all-British four-
the patient. In 1901, Karl Wupper River at wheeled car. Lanchester’s brake
Landsteiner, an Austrian Wuppertal in must have been rather noisy,
pathologist (someone who northwest because the pads were lined
studies the effects of disease Germany. It with copper. Another British
on body tissues), showed why. was designed in engineer, Herbert Frood,
Unless carefully matched, the 1901 by Eugen substituted quieter, asbestos-
red cells in one person’s blood Langen, a German lined pads in 1907.
can destroy those of another. engineer better known
He discovered three groups of for his work on Air conditioning
human blood, which he called the internal
A, B, and O. Only bloods of combustion 1902
the same group could be safely engine.
mixed. He later found a fourth Willis Carrier
group, AB, and other groups Disc
have been discovered since. Acombination of high
As well as ensuring safe brake temperature and high
transfusions, blood grouping humidity is uncomfortable.
can help eliminate suspects in This Lockheed When air is saturated with
murder cases. disc brake was water vapor, sweat cannot
made in about 1970. evaporate. US engineer Willis
Monorail Carrier realized in 1902 that
Safety razor a colleague and invented refrigeration could deal with
1901 “something that would be both heat and humidity. He
1901 used and thrown away.” It designed an “apparatus for
Eugen Langen was the disposable razor blade, treating air”, in which air was
King C. Gillette which fitted into a new safety cooled to the temperature at
Monorails are railroads with razor. Men may not have liked which moisture condenses
a single rail. The earliest King C. Gillette changed the having to buy new blades all out of it. The water was then
was built in 1880, and had its life of men the world over the time (by 1904 Gillette had drained away, producing
rail underneath the cars. The when he followed the advice of sold more than 12 million) pleasantly cool, dry air.
but they did appreciate a razor
that was safer and quicker to
use than the old, open-bladed
straight razor.

Disc brake

1902

Frederick Lanchester

Most modern cars have disc
brakes. A steel disc is
gripped between a pair of pads
when braking is needed. The
system was patented in 1902
by British car pioneer Frederick
Lanchester, who, in 1896, also

safety razor An otherwise well-
shaved King C. Gillette sports a
moustache on this 1930s packaging.

1901 On New Year’s Day, Commonwealth of Australia. It 1902 Britain’s most for services to science or art.
the six separate has an independent government, exclusive club is Only 24 people can hold it at
colonies of Australia become but it is still ruled by Britain’s formed as Edward VII founds the any one time. The first female
states in a new federation, the Queen Victoria. Order of Merit, an honor given OM will be Florence Nightingale.

173

InventIons for everyone Frank Clarke’s 1902 automatic a much higher voltage to Cotton fabric
tea maker to get it. It was contacts with a fixed gap stretched tightly
Hormones perhaps a little ahead of the between them – a spark plug. over the framework
technology. While you dozed, Ignition was now controlled
1902 clockwork struck a match that electrically. At the right of the wing
lit a flame under a kettle. When moment, the high voltage
William Bayliss, the water boiled, the steam caused a spark to jump the Cashing in
Ernest Starling operated a mechanism that gap, igniting the fuel. on this, New
tipped the kettle to pour water York retailer Morris
Hormones are chemicals into the pot, and sounded an Propellers to push the Michtom began selling
that control the body, such alarm – as if you’d need one! plane through the air plush-covered bears with shoe-
as adrenaline, which makes the button eyes and jointed limbs,
heart pound in times of stress. Spark plug Two wings linked calling them “Teddy’s Bears”.
The first hormone was by struts braced to They were a huge success, and
discovered in 1902 by British 1902 combine their strength their name soon became “teddy
physiologists (people who study bears”. At about the same time,
how living things work) William Robert Bosch, G. Honold German designer Margarete
(later Sir William) Bayliss and Steiff started making similar
Ernest Starling. They found Acommon problem bears. Although not technically
that the digestive system puts a with early internal teddies, Steiff bears became the
chemical into the bloodstream combustion engines number one best-sellers.
when food reaches it, making was how to
the pancreas secrete digestive ignite the fuel. Vacuum cleaner
juice. They called the chemical One way was
secretin. Starling later coined with sparks made 1902
the word “hormone” from the by passing electricity
Greek for “setting in motion.” through moving Hubert Booth
contacts inside the
Tea-making cylinder. In 1902, a Early gadgets for removing
alarm clock German engineer, dust just tried to blow it
G. Honold, who worked away. When British engineer
1902 for electrical engineer Hubert Booth put a
Robert Bosch, invented a
Frank Clarke better method. He applied

Although the British love
their early morning tea,
few can have risked

Copper kettle

Methylated- Teddy bear
spirit stove
1902

Morris Mitchtom,
Margarete Steiff

Popular US president
Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt
became even more popular in
1902 when he went on a
hunting expedition but refused
to shoot a defenceless bear cub.

Tea-making alarm clock
Clarke’s tea maker was
mechanical because in 1902
few homes had electricity.

1902 In April, French performance. Scottish soprano 1902 British empire (for men only) meant to promote
composer Claude Mary Garden becomes famous builder Cecil Rhodes unity among English-speaking
Debussy’s only opera, Pelléas et for her interpretation of the dies. His will creates a new nations. Rhodes Scholarships will
Mélisande, receives its first female lead, Mélisande. scholarship to Oxford University later be open to women.

174

Engine positioned 1901 – 1950
off-center to
Multistage
balance the pilot rocket

1903

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky

Russian scientist Konstantin
Tsiolkovsky was thinking
about interplanetary flight as
long ago as 1895. In 1903, he
suggested a way of getting large
objects into space, using
rockets with several stages that
would be jettisoned as their
fuel was used up. All major
rockets are now built this way.

UP AND AWAY

Takeoff and It took a century of thought
landing skid and experiment to conquer the air.
The two big problems were lift and
handkerchief over his mouth AirplAne Striking features of control, and the obvious masters of
and sucked the upholstery of the 1903 Wright Flyer included both were birds. One breakthrough
a chair, the filth he collected pusher propellers at the back, and came with the observation that a bird’s tail
convinced him that vacuum no cockpit. The plane was controlled is as important as its wings. The early pioneers
cleaning would be much better. by wires that warped the wings. also realized that flapping wings were not
His company, started in 1902, essential, which led to a practical aeroplane
made cleaners, but they were Airplane driven by a propeller.
so big they had to be parked
outside the houses they cleaned. 1903 GeorGe CAyley
A wealthy aristocrat, Cayley had
Electrocardiogram Orville Wright, established the basic shape of the
Wilbur Wright airplane by 1799. It had a fuselage
1903 carrying fixed wings and a tail. After
Although people had been much research, he launched the first
Willem Einthoven going up in balloons since human-carrying glider in 1853.
1783, they were not satisfied.
Doctors routinely check a They wanted to fly like birds, otto lilienthAl
patient’s heart by making not just drift with the wind. Lilienthal, a German engineer,
a record of its electrical activity, The first real flight was made studied the flight of birds before
called an electrocardiogram, or in North Carolina on going on to develop effective fixed-
ECG. The first person to December 17, 1903. Watched wing gliders. In 1896, after thousands
measure the heart’s electrical by his brother Wilbur, US of experimental
signals was Dutch physiologist bicycle mechanic Orville flights, he died
Willem Einthoven. Using a Wright kept their fragile plane in a crash.
sensitive instrument that he airborne for 12 seconds. The
built in 1903, he set about Wright brothers had at last oCtAve Lilienthal glider
finding out how a normal solved the two great problems ChAnute built in about
heart behaved. By 1913 he of flight: getting a machine to French-US engineer Chanute was in his 1891, seen here
had identified the points take off and controlling it in the 60s before he got interested in flying. from underneath
that doctors should look for. air. (✷ See also Up and away.) During the 1890s, he made thousands of
successful glider flights, accumulating data
that he passed on to the Wright brothers.

1903 Emmeline Pankhurst women. Ignored at first, the 1903 The Tour de France exciting stories for his paper.
founds the Women’s “suffragettes,” as they are called, bike race is started Out of 60 riders, only 21 finish.
Social and Political Union to are driven to violent methods, by French journalist Henri Maurice Garin wins after nearly
campaign for votes for British such as burning empty buildings. Desgrange to provide a source of 95 hours in the saddle.

175

InventIons for everyone Function of 1905, while experimenting Laminated glass
chromosomes with beetles, she discovered
Lie detector that two structures, the X and 1905
1905 Y chromosomes, determine
1904 whether an animal is male or Édouard Bénédictus
Nettie Stevens, female. Another American,
Max Wertheimer, Edmund Wilson Edmund Wilson, discovered The first cars had ordinary
John Larson the same thing independently. glass windshields, which
US biologist Nettie Stevens He suggested that chromosomes could slice people to ribbons
Czech psychologist Max was the first to link cell were an essential part of the in a crash. French artist
Wertheimer developed the structures with genetics. In mechanism of inheritance. Édouard Bénédictus came up
first so-called lie detector in He was right. with an answer in 1905: two
1904, while he was still a sheets of glass with plastic
student. In California, another Cat’s whisker Crystal sets glued between them. If the
medical student, John Larson, were popular in the 1920s. glass broke, the plastic held
worked with police to build a Placed in contact with a metal the fragments in place. With
better one in 1921. Known as a whisker, a crystal such as galena better filling, laminated glass
polygraph, it monitored blood (lead sulfide) could turn radio is still in use today.
pressure, pulse, and breathing, waves into sound signals – but
because these can change when only if the whisker was touching Cat’s whisker
people lie. They sometimes one of the crystal’s sensitive spots.
change when people are telling 1906
the truth, too, so not all courts Headphones
accept lie detector tests. convert varying Greenleaf Pickard
electric currents
Thermos flask into sound waves In the 1920s, listening
Wire connecting to the radio often
1904 the crystal set to meant fiddling with a
the headphones “cat’s whisker.” The whisker
Rheinhold Burger – a short piece of wire –
triode valve The De
James Dewar’s vacuum Forest Audion of 1907 was tickled the surface of a
bottle (✷ see page 162), based on a light bulb. The crystal and enabled
was far too delicate to take radio waves to work
on a picnic. One of Dewar’s screw cap connects to the headphones. German
students, Rheinhold Burger, hot cathode; the wires go physicist Karl Braun had
saw how to make it more discovered this effect in
useful. He enclosed the glass to the other electrodes.
bottle in a metal case with about 1900, but it was
protective rubber mountings “Cat’s Crystal US engineer Greenleaf
and a screw cap. Burger sold whisker” Pickard who patented
the idea to a German company the arrangement in
and, after a competition to find
a name, it was launched in 1906. His device
1904 as the Thermos flask. gave rise to one of
the most important
Theory of inventions of the 20th
relativity century, the transistor.

1905 Triode
valve
Albert Einstein
1906
See pages 178–179
for the story of Lee De Forest
how Einstein’s
theories of Electronics started
relativity shed in 1904, when
light on British scientist John
Newton’s Fleming found that a
universe. vacuum tube containing
two electrodes, one of
them heated, passed

1904 The US celebrates Missouri, the World’s Fair, where 1905 Chicago lawyer professional people dedicated to
the 100th air conditioning debuts, and the Paul P. Harris founds higher ethical standards in their
anniversary of the Louisiana 1904 Summer Olympic Games, Rotary International, a worldwide work. Meetings “rotate” from
Purchase by holding in St. Louis, where the US wins 21 events. group of business and office to office, hence the name.

176

current in one direction only. Vitamins enough. British biochemist 1901 – 1950
In 1906, US inventor Lee De Frederick (later Sir Frederick)
Forest added a third electrode. 1907 Hopkins found that rats died Color photography
By varying its voltage, he could when fed on artificial milk with Autochromes needed long exposures
control the current between the Frederick Hopkins, only these ingredients but so most were of tranquil scenes.
other two. De Forest called his Casimir Funk thrived if real milk was added. identified one of these in rice.
device the Audion. We would He concluded in 1907 that the Finding that it was a chemical
now call it a triode. He used it We all need carbohydrates, rats needed “accessory factors” called an amine, he proposed
first to detect radio waves, but proteins, minerals, and in their diet. In 1912, Polish the name “vitamine.” Not all
was soon using it to amplify fats, but these alone are not biochemist Casimir Funk vitamins are amines, but the
and generate them as well. name, minus its “e,” has stuck.

Sound radio

1906

Reginald Fessenden

Marconi got the first radio
patent in 1896 (✷ see
page 164) but it took 10 years
for radio to get a voice. Early
stations could send out radio
waves only in short bursts, but
to transmit sound, continuous
waves are needed. In 1906,
Canadian-US engineer Reginald
Fessenden invented an electric
generator that worked at 1,000
times the frequency of an
ordinary power outlet, creating
continuous radio waves that
could carry sound. His first
broadcast, on Christmas Eve,
1906, was a program of speech
and music.

Color
photography

1907

Auguste Lumière,
Louis Lumière

Before French inventors
Auguste and Louis Lumière
introduced their Autochrome
process in 1907, photographers
had to take three photographs
to get one color picture. The
Lumière brothers coated glass
with red, green, and blue starch
grains, filled the gaps between
them with black, then added a
coating that was sensitive to all
colors. The starch acted as
filters, giving three images in
one shot. These combined to
form a pleasing color picture.

1907 Irish people wanting first performance of J. M. Synge’s 1907 Italian educator known by her name. The
independence for Playboy of the Western World at Maria Montessori Montessori method is based on
their country are outraged by the the Abbey Theatre, Dublin. They begins teaching children in Rome children’s ability to learn by
portrayal of Irish peasants in the with the system that will become themselves, with guidance.
will later admire the play.

177

InventIons for everyone

RIDDLES OF SPACE AND TIME

Albert Einstein publishes his Theories of Relativity
and sheds light on Newton’s universe

Train is The time it takes a When Albert Einstein was a small boy in Germany, he saw his first
traveling beam of light to travel pocket compass. It made a great impression on him. Whichever
at nearly way he turned it, its needle always pointed the same way. Some outside
the speed up to a mirror and
down represents one
of light
tick of a clock

force was controlling it. The

incident helped set him

searching for the truth

about the universe.

Man on the train sees a short “tick” For a while, Einstein

couldn’t get a job

because he had upset

some important people.

Train in Woman on the Train has moved forward Train has moved further When he did get work
starting platform sees a by the time the light beam by the time the light beam
position long “tick” hits the mirror reaches the detector in 1902, in Bern,

Running late Switzerland, it was only
Because relative motion cannot
alter the speed of light, it must as a clerk in the Patent Office. But in his spare time he began to develop a
make moving clocks slow down.
revolutionary theory.

In 1887, US scientists Albert Michelson and Edward Morley thought

they would use light to measure the speed of Earth in its orbit through the

aether, a theoretical medium thought to pervade all space. According to

theory, light traveling in the same direction as Earth would slow down,

German- just as a car looks slower when seen from the car behind. But the speed of
US
light didn’t change. Something was wrong with a basic theory of physics.
physicist
Albert Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity, published in 1905,

Michelson rescued physics from this embarrassment. With the help of

Failed expeRiment ideas from Dutch physicist Hendrik Lorentz, Einstein
Michelson and Morley used
a turntable with two light modified the laws of physics to predict a constant speed
beams crossing it. Mirrors
combined the beams into a of light. The modifications left almost all the old laws
pattern that would show
up any difference in the of physics unchanged at ordinary speeds, but
speed of light in the two
directions. But, whichever showed how, at speeds approaching the speed of
way they turned their
table, they found no change. light, strange things happen to moving

objects. As seen by someone moving at a

different speed, their length in the

direction of motion decreases, their

US physicist mass increases, and any processes
Edward Morley within them slow down.

178

At its simplest, the Special Theory says that 1901 – 1950
the mass of an object depends on its speed. If original genius
a force acts on an object, it accelerates, but as Albert Einstein was a highly
it speeds up, more energy goes into increasing original thinker who gave us a
its mass and less into increasing its speed. This new view of the world. As well
prevents it from reaching the speed of light. One as creating the Special and
consequence is the equation E = mc2, which General Theories of Relativity, he
says that mass and energy are interchangeable. contributed greatly to the
quantum theory of matter.
Although revolutionary, the Special Theory
was incomplete. It did not deal with gravity. Black hole
Einstein put this right in 1915 with his General Theory of Gravity, a warping of space and
Relativity. Replacing Newton’s space and time with a unified time, affects everything – even
space-time, it proposed that gravity was a property of space, light. Black holes create gravity
not a force between bodies. It led to amazing predictions, so intense that light is trapped,
such as the bending of light by gravity and the existence but they can be detected by
of black holes, both of which have since been confirmed.
their effects. In this
picture, matter is

being pulled
away from a

giant star.

Young Albert was ill in
bed when his father

gave him a compass to
keep him amused.

Einstein later recalled
his vivid realization

that “something deeply
hidden had to be
behind things.”
179

Handle to Mangle for 1919 advertisement for an Electric
engage the squeezing early washing machine washing
mangle drive water out machine
Faucet for
of the letting out 1907
washing the water
Electric motor Alva Fisher
Lifting the lid mounted
automatically under the tub Inventors tried for years to
disconnected Tub was supported on find a way of reducing the
a four-legged “dolly” hours spent over a steaming
the motor washtub, but only electric
Long drive power could offer real labour
savings. The first electric
belt washing machine, the Thor,
Wooden tub was designed in 1907 by US
engineer Alva Fisher. It had a
ElEctric washing drum that turned back and
machinE Early washing forth to tumble clothes clean.
machines were often just Its motor was simply bolted
hand-operated models with on to the outside, so it wasn’t
an electric motor bolted on. all that safe with water
Even in 1920, Beatty splashing around.
Brothers of Canada, a
pioneer of washing machines, Paper cup
was still making this
wooden-tub machine with its 1908
alarmingly exposed motor.
Hugh Moore
Wheels allowed the
machine to be moved Nobody today would think
of sharing an unwashed
around easily cup with strangers, but water
in places such as railroad
stations once came from a
faucet with a shared tin cup
attached. In 1908, US inventor
Hugh Moore designed a vending
machine to deliver water in
individual paper cups. He soon
realized that selling cups was
more profitable than selling
water, and set up a company to
make them. He chose the name
Dixie in 1919. By the 1920s,
paper “Dixies” were holding ice
cream as well as drinks.

Tea bag

c 1908

Thomas Sullivan

Tea bags seem to have been
invented by accident. A
likely date is 1908. The story
is that New York tea merchant
Thomas Sullivan started

1909 Leaders meet in New (NAACP) to fight for desegregation 1910 Movie newsreels the first of a weekly news
York City to form and equal rights for blacks in begin as French compilation called Pathé Journal.
the National Association for the America. It will still be a powerful film magnate Charles Pathé’s The crowing rooster of Pathé
Advancement of Colored People organization in the 21st century. company, Pathé Frères, releases News will be known worldwide.

180

sending out tea samples Neon sign Electric starter 1901 – 1950
stitched into cloth bags. Rather
than open these, people just 1910 1912 Stainless steel
poured boiling water over
them, and Sullivan was soon Georges Claude Charles Kettering 1913
getting orders for more. By
1920, proper tea bags were Several 19th-century In early cars, the driver had to Harry Brearley
being used in the US, mainly inventors experimented with turn a handle at the front to
large ones for the catering tubes containing gas at low start the engine. The handle British metallurgist Harry
trade. Teabags were introduced pressure, and found that could kick dangerously. Henry Brearley hit on stainless
to Britain by Joseph Tetley & electricity could make the gas Leland, head of Cadillac Motors, steel by accident while trying
Company in 1953. light up. In 1910, French found this unacceptable, and to make a steel that would
resist the heat inside a gun.
neon Sign New techinques had physicist Georges Claude tried asked US engineer Charles He was in charge of the Firth
to be invented before neon signs the gas neon, and found that it Kettering to create a self-
could be widely used for advertising. produced an intense orange-red starter. Kettering succeeded Brown Laboratories
glow. This was of little use for where earlier inventors in Sheffield, England,
Fertilizer from lighting, but after the new had failed, and the 1912 an important steel
the air tubes had been used at the Cadillac was the first car making center. In
Paris Motor Show, an that could be started from 1913, after a series of
1909 advertising agency suggested the driver’s seat. experiments, he made
that they could be made into some steel containing
Fritz Haber, signs. By 1912, the first neon Cosmic rays about 13 per cent
Carl Bosch sign was in place over a chromium. He found
Montmartre barber’s shop. 1913 that it was of little use
Plants need nitrogen. for guns, but realized
Although air is four-fifths Continental Victor Hess that it was resistant
nitrogen, plants cannot absorb drift to corrosion. Unlike
it directly. Nitrogen-rich The pioneers of other scientists, who
fertilizers are one answer, but 1912 radioactivity found had made similar
by 1900, natural supplies, their instruments steels, Brearley saw its
such as bird droppings, were Alfred Wegener responding to radiation potential for cutlery.
beginning to run out. In 1909, from outside their labs. Its It was a local Sheffield
German chemist Fritz Haber If you look at an atlas of the origin was a mystery until cutler who suggested
succeeded in capturing world, you will see that US physicist Victor Hess the name that we now
nitrogen from the air. He used South America and Africa sent balloons carrying use for it.
heat and high pressure to make would fit together like jigsaw- measuring instruments
it react with hydrogen, forming puzzle pieces. In 1912, German high into the atmosphere. Mark of stainless
ammonia, which could be meteorologist Alfred Wegener By 1913, he had found steel makers Butler
made into fertilizers and other said that this was not a that the radiation became of Sheffield
products. By 1914, another coincidence. He said that all stronger as the balloons
German chemist, Carl Bosch, the continents had once been went higher, suggesting Bone handle
had found a way to increase joined together as a continent that the “rays” came from
the yield of ammonia, and he called Pangaea, which began beyond Earth. US physicist StainleSS Steel This
developed Haber’s method for to drift apart millions of years Robert Millikan confirmed tea knife of 1915 was
large-scale use. The Haber- ago. His ideas were forgotten, this, and in 1925 coined one of the first that did
Bosch process is now essential but in the 1960s, scientists the term “cosmic rays” for not need cleaning with
to agriculture and much else. realized that he had been right. this radiation from the an abrasive after a meal.
depths of the universe.
Assembly
line

1913

Henry Ford

See pages 182–183
for the story of
how Henry Ford
adopted the assembly line to
mass produce the world’s
most successful car.

1911 On December 14, the South Pole. Powered only by 1912 On the night of voyage. By the next morning it
Norwegian explorer dogs, they beat the motorized Sunday, April 14, is on the bottom of the Atlantic
Roald Amundsen and his team expedition led by Robert Scott, Ocean. More than 1,500 people
become the first people to reach which sadly never returns. the supposedly unsinkable Titanic die, but about 700 are saved.
hits an iceberg on its maiden

181

InventIons for everyone

A MOTOR FOR THE MULTITUDE

Henry Ford adopts the assembly line to mass
produce the world’s most successful car

Man of vision In 1891, when the first modern
Henry Ford looked to a car was built, Henry Ford was
future in which efficient a young engineer working in
production methods
would make everyone Detroit, Michigan, not far from
rich. His factory
eventually had raw the farm where he had been born.
materials going in at
one end and finished Most people still worked on the land.
cars coming out
at the other. Ford would be one of the people who
Tin Lizzie
Between 1908 and 1927, helped to change this, transforming the US
one of every two cars
built in the world was a into an industrial nation.
Model T. With its rugged
construction and low By 1896, Ford had built his first car. In 1903,
price, it was ideal for
the still rural US. he set up the Ford Motor Company. At that time, cars were

More cars individually built and very expensive, so they were strictly for the
The Ford story does
not, of course, end rich. Ford realized he
with the Model T.
Later designs could keep costs down by
included the sleek
Edsel, the sporty producing just one type of
Mustang, and the
GT40, designed car, and in 1908 he launched
in Britain and built
for serious racing. “a motor car for the great

multitude” – the Model T.

Demand for the “Tin Lizzie,” as

it was nicknamed, was soon running

Model T Tourer (1916) ahead of supply, and Ford moved to
a new factory at Highland Park, just

outside Detroit. Even here, people still

had to walk from car to car to work on

each one – and when they were walking

Ford Edsel (1958) they were not working.
Ford wanted to find a faster, less

expensive production method. In the US

meat industry, workers stood still while

carcasses were moved slowly past them.

Ford Mustang (1964) In 1913, Ford experimented with this

“assembly line” idea for making part of the

Model T. Output of the part went up by

300 percent, so he decided to make the

Ford GT40 (1964) whole car on an assembly line.

182

1901 – 1950

Ford succeeded in his mission to bring mobility
to the masses, and in doing so changed the
American way of life. As well as providing
pleasure on picnics, low-cost vehicles made
every industry more efficient.

Now, instead of wandering around Modern Manufacture
the factory, workers spent all their time The first cars had their bodies
adding parts to cars as they passed by. bolted onto a separate chassis,
Each worker did only one operation, but today’s car body is a single,
and their pace was set by the moving self-supporting steel shell. For
line. By April 1914, Ford had cut the many years, the shell was hand-
time it took to make a car from 12 welded together by skilled
man-hours to one and a half. Soon the workers, but such heavy,
factory was turning out a car every repetitive tasks are now done
24 seconds. The Model T became the by robots, like these at Ford’s
world’s most successful car, with total sales reaching more than 15 million. plant in Ontario, Canada.

The assembly line did have its disadvantages. Working in this way
was stressful, so workers often left. Ford solved this problem by doubling
his workers’ pay and reducing the hours they had to work. It seemed
crazy, but it was just good business. Ford realized that his employees
had a private life and didn’t just make cars. Thanks to his new methods,
they would soon be buying them, too.

183

InventIons for everyone couldn’t carry it around. In happens near a massive star Intelligence test
1915, US inventor Maurice that has collapsed to a single
Structure of the Levy attached a solid lipstick to point. Its gravity becomes so 1916
atom a sliding carrier inside a intense that within a certain
metal tube with a lid. Lewis Terman
1913 The lipstick could distance (now called the
be slid out for use, Schwarzschild radius), even Although nobody seems to
Niels Bohr then put back light cannot escape. Black know whether intelligence
safely inside its can really be measured,
British physicist Ernest container to holes, as they are now intelligence tests are still in
Rutherford pictured the protect handbags known, emit no light but use. Their results are expressed
hydrogen atom as a heavy and pockets. can be detected by the as an “intelligence quotient,”
nucleus with an electron Lipstick soon effect of their gravity or IQ, with an IQ of 100
orbiting around it. But classical became more on nearby stars. representing average
physics said this could not be widely used. Lipstick As this early intelligence. The first widely
right because the electron print shows, lip colour used test, the Stanford-Binet,
would radiate energy and became popular when was published in 1916 by US
stop orbiting. Danish physicist presented in convenient, psychologist Lewis Terman.
Niels Bohr saved the situation solid form. A professor at Stanford
in 1913 by showing that University, Terman based his
electrons could radiate energy Domestic fooD mixer By test on earlier ones devised by
only when jumping from a the 1930s, when many homes French psychologists Alfred
higher to a lower orbit. The had electricity, appliances like Binet and Theodore Simon.
radiation would appear as light food mixers were beginning to
whose frequency depended on be more widely used. Domestic
the size of the jump. food mixer

Bra 1919

1914 Herbert Johnson

Mary Jacob Bakers had been
mixing dough
Although a “breast by electricity for
supporter” was patented in years before an
1893, the idea didn’t catch on
until New York partygoer Mary effective mixer
Jacob realized that whalebone reached the
corsets and her new, slinky
dress just didn’t go together. Black hole
She sewed together a couple of
handkerchiefs and some ribbon 1916
and wore that instead of the
whalebone. In 1914, she Karl Schwarzschild
changed her name to Caresse
Crosby, patented the brassière, German astronomer Karl
and started selling it. Although Schwarzschild published
she was not very successful in his first scientific paper while
this, she did manage to sell the still a schoolboy. In 1916, the
idea to a big corset company, year of his death, he published
and by the 1920s women a more important one. Using
everywhere were wearing bras. Einstein’s General Theory of
Relativity (✷ see pages
Lipstick 178–179), he worked out what

1915

Maurice Levy

Lipstick has been with us for
centuries, but without a
convenient package, women

1914 Archduke Ferdinand, resulting conflict escalates to 1916 A work that will Planets, is published by British
heir to the Austrian involve 32 countries. It will become a favourite composer Gustav Holst. His
and Hungarian thrones, is end in 1918, after 47 million
assassinated on 28 June. The people have been killed. of concert goers and science- orchestral suite portrays the
fiction producers alike, The
planets’ astrological characters.

184

1901 – 1950

kitchen. Early domestic mixers a neat device could do the job, PuBlic Broadcasting
were little more than motorized the Rawlplug became everyone’s service Using
egg-whisks, but the Troy Metal favorite wall anchor. valves, not
Products H-5, introduced in a crystal,
1919 and later called the Public this 1925
Kitchen Aid, was based on a broadcasting Ethophone
professional mixer designed by radio gave
US engineer Herbert Johnson. service superior
Its built-in bowl revolved in the performance.
opposite direction to the beaters, 1920
and this “planetary” action is Frame
now used in most mixers. David Sarnoff, antenna was
Guglielmo Marconi
Wall anchor turned
Although US engineer toward the
1919 Reginald Fessenden
broadcast speech and music in required
John Rawlings 1906, and US radio executive transmitting
David Sarnoff proposed a “radio
British builder John Rawlings music box” in 1915, real public station
didn’t like the way other broadcasting only began in the Mahogany
builders attached things to 1920s. By this time, electronics
walls. They just chiseled out a had developed greatly, allowing case
large hole, rammed in a lump big transmitters to be built. The
of wood and put a screw in it. first regular service was started Tuning
The attachment was weak, and in Britain by Guglielmo Marconi dials
it messed up the wall. Rawlings in February 1920. In November
realized that screws would grip 1920, US station KDKA began
small, drilled holes if they were broadcasting from Philadelphia.
surrounded by something that Governments in both countries
expanded as they went in. After later stepped in to regulate the
trying brass, he devised a wall new medium. (✷ See also Birth
anchor made of fiber. Once he of broadcasting.)
had convinced people that such

BIRTH OF BROADCASTING

To TransmiT sound, a
radio transmitter needs to generate
powerful, continuous, high-frequency waves. Reginald Fessenden
pioneered these with high-speed electric generators, but it was
the development of large electronic valves during World War I
that really made broadcasting possible. The first listeners had to
build their own receivers because the lack of regular broadcasts
meant there was no market for ready-made radios.

Listening to radio on a train in 1930 Broadcasting in Britain Broadcasting in the usa
Marconi’s early radio broadcasts were Unhampered by red tape, and led by
banned, but after public pressure, his visionaries such as David Sarnoff of
company was allowed to broadcast for the Radio Corporation of America, US
15 minutes a week from a hut near broadcasting grew rapidly. By 1922, the
Chelmsford, starting in February 1922. US had 600 stations, mainly financed
In May, the station moved to London, by advertising, while Britain still had
and October saw the birth of the British only one. But competition threatened
Broadcasting Company. In 1927, this chaos, so in 1927 the industry finally
became a public corporation, the BBC. came under government regulation.

1917 The Union of Soviet Congress of Soviets, controlled 1920 American women are With votes hanging in the balance,
Socialist Republics, by the Bolsheviks under their finally given the right Tennessee finally votes to ratify
the USSR, is formed following leader Vladimir Lenin, takes over to vote when the 19th Amendment the amendment, bringing the
the Russian revolution. The the former Russian Empire. to the US Constitution is ratified. vote count to 36 states in favor.

185

InventIons for everyone Insulin Best, worked out a way to stop restore smooth running. Most
the pancreas’s juices from cars used leaded gasoline until
Self-adhesive 1921 destroying the hormone. Thanks the 1980s, when concerns
bandage to their work, insulin is now about pollution caused a switch
Frederick Banting, available for controlling diabetes. to fuels that didn’t need lead to
1920 Charles Best stop the knock.
Leaded gasoline
Earle Dickson Insulin is a hormone that tells Ice pop
the liver to remove glucose 1921
Before ready-made dressings, from the blood. People whose 1923
cuts were covered with bodies cannot make enough Thomas Midgley Jr
gauze stuck down with tape. insulin suffer from diabetes, in Frank Epperson
Earle Dickson, of US surgical which blood glucose may reach In a properly adjusted car
dressing manufacturer Johnson dangerous levels. It was known engine, the fuel and air Refreshing, flavored ice on a
& Johnson, changed this in that insulin came from a gland burn smoothly rather than stick was patented by US
1920. Working in his kitchen, called the pancreas, but efforts exploding. When engineers salesman Frank Epperson in
he took a strip of adhesive tape, to extract it from the pancreas made car engines more 1924, but its US brand name,
laid down squares of gauze on of certain animals failed. The powerful by increasing the Popsicle, was registered a year
it, covered it with fabric and organ’s digestive juices were pressure inside them, they earlier. The legend is that
rolled it up for future use. His also released and digested the found that destructive Epperson invented the ice lolly
invention was soon on sale as insulin before it could be explosions, or “knocking,” by accident in 1905, when he
Band-Aid. In 1928, T. J. Smith extracted. Then, in 1921, became a problem. In 1921, US was a boy, by leaving a drink
& Nephew introduced the Canadian doctor Frederick engineer Thomas Midgley Jr with a stirrer in it out on a cold
similar Elastoplast to Britain. (later Sir Frederick) Banting, discovered that adding lead night. His patent describes
assisted by a student, Charles compounds to the fuel could cylindrical ice pops made in
Tube connects ordinary test tubes.
the pump to InsulIn
a needle This modern Traffic signal
electric pump
Dials for gives someone 1923
setting the with diabetes
amount of insulin a convenient Garrett Morgan
to be injected way to inject
themselves Atraffic signal was installed
with insulin, in London in 1868, but a
slowly and more widely used signal was
continuously. patented by US inventor

Viewfinder

Theremin

1920

Leon Theremin 35-mm camera The
Leica was not a single-lens reflex, as
The theremin was the first most 35-mm cameras are today, but gave good results.
successful electronic
musical instrument. Still
played today, it produces
those spooky wailing sounds
popular in science-fiction
films. It was invented in 1920
by Russian scientist Leon
Theremin, who originally
called it the etherophone. It
is one of the few instruments
played by waving the hands
near it rather than touching it.
The distance of the hands
affects its tuning, giving total
control over its unearthly notes.

1921 Nine years after the shrine to his memory is built in 1922 British archaeologist Tutankhamen in the Valley of the
death of Emperor Tokyo. Its traditional wooden Howard Carter Kings. Unlike most tombs, this
Meiji, who helped Japan become buildings will be destroyed in discovers the treasure-filled tomb one has not been looted, making
a modern industrial nation, a an air raid 24 years later. of the Egyptian pharaoh it important to Egyptology.

186

Garrett Morgan in 1923. It had Frozen Food Numbers on Support for 1901 – 1950
three movable arms with STOP Frozen peas are only the scale the scale
and GO written on them, good to eat if frozen indicated Sample Cotton swab
mounted on a pole. Signals at just the right tenderness of peas
were given by raising, moment. The was placed 1925
lowering, and swiveling the tenderometer, Blades inside in this
arms to show or hide these developed in about the chamber chamber Leo Gerstenzang
words. The signal also had a 1938 for the US were driven
position that stopped all traffic, canning industry, by a motor Cotton-tipped
to allow an orderly switch from could test peas to sticks for
one direction to another. ensure that they Weight was cleaning up babies
were neither too pushed were invented by Polish-US
Frozen food tough nor too businessman Leo Gerstenzang
tender to freeze. sideways by in 1925, supposedly after
1924 the peas to seeing his wife struggle with
Handle was give a reading cotton balls and toothpicks.
Clarence Birdseye turned to start They got their US brand name,
Q-tips, in 1926. It had taken
US naturalist Clarence the machine Gerstenzang several years to
Birdseye got the idea perfect a machine that made
for frozen foods on a trip to Chute for the new product, then packed
Newfoundland, Canada, in crushed and wrapped it hygienically.
1912. It’s very cold there, and The sticks were originally made
Birdseye saw people leaving pea waste of wood, but in 1958 a British
freshly caught fish outside to invention, the paper lollipop
freeze. He invented a machine stick, was substituted. Outside
that froze fish between the US, a similar product is
refrigerated metal plates, and in known by another brand name,
1924 helped found the General Cotton Buds.
Seafoods Corporation. He was
soon selling quick-frozen fruit Aerosol
and vegetables as well as fish.
His name lives on as the 1926
familiar brand name Birds Eye.
Erik Rothheim,
35-mm camera Lyle Goodhue

1924 The first aerosol can was
invented by Norwegian
Oskar Barnack engineer Erik Rothheim in
1926. It was used for
The first packaging paint and polish,
precision but never really caught on.
miniature camera More successful was an aerosol
was the Leica, developed in 1941 by US
designed by German mechanic chemist Lyle Goodhue. He
Oskar Barnack. It went into
production in 1924. Barnack found that the new can
had started working on it was ideal for spraying
much earlier, but was delayed cockroaches with insecticide
by World War I. To make the
Leica, he adapted to kill them. Millions of
an instrument for testing these “bug bombs”
35-mm movie film, made were supplied to
by the company he US troops in World
worked for, Ernst Leitz. War II, and by
He created the now 1946 aerosols
standard frame size, were in
24 × 36 mm, simply by production for
doubling the size of a domestic use.
movie frame. Fifty years
later, world
production
was numbered
in billions.

1925 One of the first films made in Russia by Sergey 1926The first woman to two hours off the record as she
to use the technique swim the English makes it from Cap Gris-Nez in
of “montage” – telling a story by Eisenstein. His Battleship Channel unaided, US Olympic northern France to Kingsdown,
rapid cutting between shots – is Potemkin will become a model swimmer Gertrude Ederle, knocks Kent, in 14 hours, 31 minutes.
for many other film makers.

187

InventIons for everyone use liquid fuel, which allows Plant growth
much more controllable motors hormones
Film to be built. The first liquid-
soundtrack fueled rocket was launched by 1926
US physicist Robert Goddard.
1926 Burning gasoline and liquid Friedrich Went
oxygen, it lifted off
Lee De Forest briefly from his The life of plants is
Aunt Effie’s farm controlled by a number
Sound for the first films was in Auburn, of different hormones. The first
supplied by live musicians. Massachusetts, to be discovered was a group
The only recordings available on March 16, known as auxins. Dutch
were gramophone discs, and it 1926. It was botanist Friedrich Went, a
was difficult to keep these in another 15 years professor at the University of
step with the film. The obvious before the same Utrecht, found them in 1926
place for the recording was on idea was used in while studying how plants
the film itself. The first person Adolf Hitler’s grow. He discovered that
to succeed in putting it there deadly flying auxins were not only
was US inventor Lee De Forest. bombs during responsible for stimulating
His Phonofilm system of 1926 World War II. plant growth, but were also
produced the first soundtrack – involved in the one-sided
a narrow stripe down the side growth that makes plants Pop-up toaster
of the film, recording sound bend towards the light.
waves as a varying shade of 1926
gray. It was the forerunner of Liquid-fueLed rocket A
the later, more successful Titan II rocket lifts off in Charles Strite
Movietone system. January 1965 carrying an
unmanned Gemini Burnt toast was normal
Liquid-fuelled spacecraft. The 100 ft- with early electric toasters.
rocket (30 m-) long rocket was They just kept toasting until
powered by the liquid someone turned them off. The
1926 fuel hydrazine. first that turned off and popped
the toast out automatically
Robert Goddard Combustion was patented in 1919 by US
tank where fuel inventor Charles Strite. It was
The first rockets used solid mixed with designed for caterers. The
fuel. They were really just oxidiser burned toaster as we know it, based on
big fireworks. Modern rockets Strite’s design, did not reach
the breakfast table until 1926,
when the Waters Genter
Company, later known as
McGraw Electric, marketed
the first Toastmaster.

Expanding
universe

1927

Edwin Hubble

Until US astronomer Edwin
Hubble started studying
the sky in the 1920s, nobody
suspected that there were
countless galaxies beyond our
own Milky Way. Having proved
the existence of such galaxies,
Hubble discovered in 1927 that

1926 The Showa (bright content to leave government to 1927 Indian lawyer the social status of the Dalits, or
peace) period begins others until August 1945, when Bhimrao Ranji “Untouchables.” He will urge the
in Japan with the enthronement he ends World War II by insisting Ambedkar begins a campaign of Dalits, traditionally given the
of Emperor Hirohito. He is that Japan surrenders. direct action aimed at improving worst jobs, to take up Buddhism.

188

Internal clock for one person to pick up. A 1901 –1950
chainsaw light enough for one Belgian astronomer Georges
1927 person to wield didn’t appear Lemaître proposed a simple,
until 1950, made by a but radical explanation:
Curt Richter company founded by Lerp’s everything had originally been
rival, Andreas Stihl. squeezed into an incredibly
Anyone who has had jet- dense “primeval atom” that had
lag knows that we have Big Bang theory exploded to create the universe
a built-in clock that tells us we know. In 1948, Russian
when to be active and when to 1927 physicist George Gamow
sleep. The first scientist to revived Lemaître’s idea in an
study this was US biologist Georges Lemaître, attempt to explain how the
Curt Richter, head of the George Gamow chemical elements were
psychiatric clinic at the Johns formed. British astronomer
Hopkins University in Baltimore. In 1927, Edwin Hubble Fred Hoyle scornfully dubbed
In 1927, he published the discovered that the universe this the Big Bang theory, and
results of research into the is expanding. In the same year, the name stuck. (✷ See also
biorhythms, or internal Starting with a bang.)

PoP-uP toaSter By the 1960s, cycles, that govern animal
toasters were looking more stylish, behavior. We now know they
but their principle – releasing the apply to humans, too.
toast after a set time – was the same.
Chainsaw

1927

they were rushing away from Emil Lerp, Andreas Stihl Big Bang theory It is impossible to know what the Big Bang was like,
us, with speeds that increased but this is an artist’s impression.
the further away they were. The world’s first gas-engined
The universe, far from being chainsaw let rip on Mount
changeless, was expanding. Dolmar, Germany, in 1927.
Cosmologists now accept this German engineer Emil Lerp’s
as evidence for the Big Bang new, “portable” sawing machine
that started it all. had a moving chain like a
modern saw, but was too heavy

 STARTING WITH A BANG

When Albert einstein heArd Georges Lemaître’s Big Bang theory, George Gamow
he exclaimed “This is the most beautiful and satisfactory explanation (right) with
of creation to which I have ever listened.” Although it doesn’t Swiss-US physicist
explain where the “primeval atom” came from, an explosion Wolfgang Pauli
about 15 billion years ago does account for the universe we
see today. Backed up by recent evidence, the Big Bang is
now the preferred picture of the beginning of time.

evidence for the Big Bang Steady State theory
The strongest evidence for the Big In the same year that George Gamow
Bang is the expansion discovered by revived the Big Bang theory, British
Hubble. The theory also predicts that astronomers Hermann Bondi, Thomas
the universe should be filled with Gold, and Fred Hoyle proposed that
low-level microwave radiation, and the universe had always existed in a
this was found in 1965. Finally, about “steady state”. They suggested that as
a quarter of the universe (by mass) is the universe expanded, new matter
made of helium. Stars alone could filled the gaps to keep everything
not have produced this amount, but looking the same. Recent discoveries
the first fireball could. have made this theory seem unlikely.

1927 Australia’s architect Walter Griffin. Building 1927 Intrepid US aviator Atlantic single-handed in his
parliament moves work had started in 1913. The Charles Lindbergh plane The Spirit of St Louis.
from Melbourne to Canberra, a name derives from an Aboriginal lands safely at Le Bourget airport, The flight from Roosevelt Field,
new city designed by US word meaning “meeting place”. near Paris, after crossing the
Long Island, makes him a star.

189

BuBBle gum This Dubble Bubble gum
Bubble advertisement from
the 1940s is obviously 1928
aimed at children. Unlike
chewing gum, bubble gum Walter Diemer
has always been seen as
mainly a product for Walter Diemer, a young
children and teenagers. accountant working for
the Fleer Chewing Gum
Uncertainty Chloro- on Earth’s protective ozone Company in Philadelphia,
principle fluorocarbons layer, so they have not been Pennsylvania, thought he could
made since the late 1990s. improve on the company’s
1927 1928 electric razor Razors like product. In 1928 he produced
this 1934 Schick allowed men to a gum that was so stretchy he
Werner Heisenberg Thomas Midgley Jr, shave anywhere there was an could blow bubbles with it. He
Albert Henne electrical outlet. had created bubble gum. His
Elementary particles, such company started selling it as
as electrons, are described Early refrigerators used Dubble Bubble. Diemer taught
by the branch of physics chemicals like ammonia, the sales force how to blow the
called quantum mechanics which is extremely smelly and perfect bubble, and the gum
(✷ see page 169). This says poisonous. In 1928, it took US became a favorite worldwide.
that a particle is not only a scientists Thomas Midgley Jr
particle, but also a wave. One and Albert Henne just two Penicillin
consequence of this is that days to find something better:
nobody can know both the chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs. 1928
momentum (mass × velocity) These compounds of chlorine,
and position of a particle at the fluorine, and carbon had Alexander Fleming,
same time. Momentum comes already been produced by Ernst Chain, Howard Florey
from a spread-out wave, while Belgian chemist Frederic Swarts
position comes from a in the 1890s, but Midgley and See pages 192–193 for the
concentrated wave, and you Henne found a better way of story of how Ernst Chain
can’t have both at once. making them. Unfortunately, and Howard Florey built on
German physicist Werner they have a devastating effect Alexander Fleming’s lucky find.
Heisenberg announced this
“uncertainty principle” in 1927. Electric razor

1928

Jacob Schick

Attempts to do away with
wet shaving go back to
1908 or earlier, but the first

Spare
cutter

Electric
lead

1927 Thin meets fat as Hal Roach’s Hollywood Studio for 1928 British women only if they owned a house, were
two stars, Stan finally get the same married to a man who owned a
Laurel from Britain and Oliver their first film, Putting Pants on voting rights as men, after 10 house, or had a university degree
Hardy from the US, team up at Philip. The comic duo will make years in which they could vote and were over 30.
many more films together.
190

inventor to tackle the problem the fact that sliced bread Rubber 1901 – 1950
successfully was Lieutenant- quickly went stale. By 1928, cap holds
Colonel Jacob Schick of the Rohwedder had perfected a electrodes Electrodes on scalp
US Army. In 1928, he used machine that not only sliced,
the profits from an earlier but also wrapped the bread into in place Wires connect
invention, a razor that stored a handy, long-lasting package. electrodes to
blades in its handle, to finance Within five years, most bread ElEctro- a recording
his new electric razor. Despite in the US came sliced. instrument
the Great Depression that hit EncEphalograph
the US in the following year, Prestressed are lined up in one particular
Schick’s dry shaver was soon concrete This modern EEG direction. Polaroid sunglasses,
selling well. cap was made by which admit only vertically
1928 Neuramedical Supplies. polarized light, can reduce
Cinemascope troublesome reflections from
Eugène Freyssinet Multipin smooth horizontal surfaces like
1928 connector water and roads. US physicist
Ordinary concrete tends plugs into Edwin Land perfected this
Henri Chrétien, to crack under loads that the recorder material, which has many other
Claude Autant-Lara stretch it. One elegant solution uses, in 1929. The thin plastic
was invented in 1928 by Polaroid sheet, treated with optically
Cinemascope squeezes a French civil engineer Eugène active crystals, quickly replaced
wide image onto normal Freyssinet. He put stretched 1929 the bulkier polarizers that had
movie film by distorting it with steel wires into concrete while been used earlier.
a special lens. A similar lens on it was wet. When it had set, he Edwin Land
the projector distorts the image released the wires so that they
back again to produce a wide- squeezed the concrete together, Polaroid polarizes light. That
screen picture. French physicist canceling out the forces that is, it blocks all light waves
Henri Chrétien invented the would otherwise make it crack. except those whose vibrations
lens in the late 1920s, and Prestressed concrete is now
experimental films were made used to produce light, strong
in 1928 by French film director structures of all kinds.
Claude Autant-Lara. But
Cinemascope really hit the Electro-
screens in the 1950s, as movies encephalograph
struggled to tempt audiences
away from television. 1929

Sliced bread Hans Berger

1928 Electrodes placed on
someone’s head can
Otto Rohwedder reveal the electrical activity
of their brain. This helps
Devising a machine that doctors to diagnose disorders
sliced bread can’t have such as epilepsy. An
been that difficult, but US electroencephalograph,
inventor Otto Rohwedder took or EEG, machine,
16 years to do it. One reason records the activity as
was that in 1917, after five a set of squiggly lines.
years’ work, he lost everything The first machine was built
in a fire. More important was by German physiologist Hans
Berger in 1929, after five years’
work with dogs and humans.
No-one showed much interest
in Berger’s work at first, but a
local optical company, Carl
Zeiss, was impressed by his
device and helped him to
build a better one.

1928 A groundbreaking Principles, is published after years 1929 In October, prices poured money into the market.
new dictionary of of work by James Murray and on the New York The crash triggers a depression
the English language, A New stock exchange collapse, ruining that lasts for years and makes
English Dictionary on Historical others. It will be better known as thousands of people who had millions of people jobless.
the Oxford English Dictionary.
191

InventIons for everyone

THE ANTIBIOTIC MIRACLE

Howard Florey and Ernst Chain build on
Alexander Fleming’s find to develop a life saver

It was September 1928. Scottish bacteriologist
Alexander Fleming was showing a friend some plates
he used for growing bacteria. Suddenly he

stopped. The plate in his hand was

covered with bacteria, but there was also

a patch of mold, and around the mold

there were no bacteria.

Fleming worked at Sir Almroth

Wright’s vaccine laboratories in St. Mary’s

Hospital, London. There, he grew more mold

and made an extract he called penicillin. He

tested it, used it to cure an eye infection, and

wrote about it, but pursued it no further. He was

more interested in vaccines. Penicillin, he thought,

Alexander Fleming working in his lab at would be best used in laboratories.
St. Mary’s Hospital, Paddington, London Ten years later, German biochemist Ernst

Chain, working at the Sir William Dunn School of Pathology in Oxford,

England, suggested to his boss, Australian pathologist Howard Florey, that

they should investigate penicillin. Florey decided to see if it would affect

Culture dish showing the effect bacteria inside animals – something Fleming hadn’t tried. Chain’s job
of penicillin on bacteria would be to isolate the active agent from the mould.

HAppy Accident In May 1940, Florey injected eight mice with lethal bacteria. Then he
Bacteria can be grown in injected four of them with penicillin. The next day, the untreated mice
dishes filled with nutrient were dead, but the rest were fine. Florey phoned a colleague. “It’s a
gelatin. Fleming had piles
of these lying around, miracle,” he told her.
which led to his lucky find. Florey wanted to test

penicillin on human patients,

AnimAl mAgic but to produce enough he had to
Fleming thought turn his lab into a factory. Soon it was filled
that penicillin with piping and chemical fumes. By February 1941,
would be good he had enough penicillin for the first human
for getting rid trial. Policeman Albert Alexander was gravely ill with a serious
of unwanted infection. On February 12, 1941, he started receiving penicillin. The
bacteria in the
laboratory. But Florey
and Chain saw its potential
for curing disease, and were effect was spectacular. He almost recovered, but Florey didn’t have enough
the first to try it on mice. penicillin to keep the treatment going, and Alexander died. Later, five

192

1901 – 1950

World War II added
urgency to the development
of penicillin. Thousands of

servicemen were saved by
the miracle drug as wound

infections that would
previously have been fatal
were stopped in their tracks.

World War II poster
advertising penicillin

more patients were given

penicillin. All improved. Laboratory
vessel
Some were saved from death. Penicillin

Florey decided to make a lot

more penicillin. Nobody in

wartime Britain Tin
tank
could help, so he

went to the US. There, experts

devised a better way of growing mold, and a

drug company started producing penicillin in Science on

bulk. It would be needed, because by December a ShoeString

1941 the US was at war. Florey and Chain had little
money or time, so they
Back in Britain, production at Florey’s lab was had to improvise. Early
vessels for growing mold
stepped up, chemical companies started helping, were made from cocoa
tins soldered onto cookie
and further tests were organized. By 1943, there tins, but later, glass
equipment allowed large-
was no doubt. Penicillin was a lifesaver. Thanks scale production.

to Fleming, Chain, and Florey, the first antibiotic

had arrived. Others followed within a few years. Early
samples
Together, they have saved millions of lives. Fermentation vessel

193

InventIons for everyone US grocer Clarence Saunders. Ohain thought up a similar in 1930. Seven years later,
His Piggly Wiggly store in engine, it was immediately Colin Kininmonth and George
Synthetic Memphis, Tennessee, cut costs taken up by a major plane Gray produced Sellotape, a
rubber tires by letting customers take their company. The first jet plane, British competitor.
purchases right off the shelves, a Heinkel HE-178, flew from
1929 something unheard of at the a German airfield in 1939, Radio
time. The other vital two years before the first astronomy
Walter Bock, ingredients, bulk buying and British jet flight.
Eduard Tschunkur quick turnover, were added in 1931
1930 when another US grocer, Clear adhesive
By the 1880s, scientists had Michael Cullen, opened his tape Karl Jansky, Grote Reber
some idea of the chemical King Kullen store in an old
composition of rubber, but their garage in Long Island, New 1930 Radio astronomy started at
attempts to copy it failed. They York. Customers flocked to Bell Telephone Labs in the
had more success when they this, the first true supermarket. Richard Drew US, where engineer Karl Jansky
tried imitating its properties was tracking down radio
rather than its chemistry. In Jet engine Cellophane appeared in the interference. One source of
1929, German chemists Walter late 1920s. One of its main interference eluded him until,
Bock and Eduard Tschunkur 1930 uses was for wrapping items in 1931, after months of
made a synthetic rubber good like flowers and fruit to make frustration, he pointed his
enough for tires. This was Frank Whittle, them look attractive, so it antenna upward. The
important in World War II, Hans von Ohain demanded a clear sealing tape mysterious interference was
when Germany’s natural rubber to go with it. First to solve the coming from the stars. Another
supplies were cut off. The jet engine was patented problem was US engineer US radio engineer Grote Reber
in 1930 by a young British Richard Drew of the Minnesota built the first radio telescope, a
Supermarket Royal Air Force pilot, Frank Mining and Manufacturing 31 ft (9.5 m) dish, in 1937. By
(later Sir Frank) Whittle. He Company, now known as 3M. 1942 he had made the first
1930 had great difficulty convincing Having invented masking tape radio map of the sky.
anyone that it would be useful. – an adhesive tape made from
Michael Cullen Things were different in paper – in 1925, he coated Electronic flash
Germany. When Hans von Cellophane with a similar
The first essential of a 1931
supermarket is self-service. adhesive to produce
This was invented in 1916 by Scotch Tape Harold Edgerton

The flash in most of today’s
cameras took 50 years to
perfect. It started as a bulky

device used when taking
research photographs

Jet engine The Gloster E28/39 was the Undercarriage Wings
first plane to be equipped with the jet engine retracts designed for
designed by Frank Whittle. It took to the during flight subsonic flight
skies in April 1941, four years after Whittle’s
first engine was started up, and two years
after the first successful German jet flight.

1930 After 19 days’ solo Australia, from England. The feat, 1930 After the formation Montevideo, Uruguay. Only
flying in a converted achieved after only 50 hours’ of the soccer 13 teams compete, which do
De Havilland Moth, British aviator flying experience, wins Johnson a organization FIFA in 1904, the not include any from Britain.
Amy Johnson reaches Darwin, £10,000 ($48,500) prize World Cup finally kicks off in Uruguay takes the cup.

194

of high-speed objects, such as He called it Criss-Cross. because it contains a heavier 1901 – 1950
bullets. US engineer Harold Nobody wanted to make the form of hydrogen, called
Edgerton realized as early as game, so Butts went into deuterium. US chemist Full-color movie
1926 that a high voltage partnership with a retired Harold Urey discovered The Technicolor camera
applied to a tube containing government official, James deuterium in 1931. He then was really three cameras
xenon gas could produce very Brunot, who started making it realized that electrolysis in one. After processing,
brief but intense pulses of light. in his garage. Renamed Lexico, of water releases more its three films were
By 1931 he had devised a the game went on sale in 1946. hydrogen than deuterium, printed on to a single
practical flash. Within two years, games leaving behind water enriched film for projection.
makers Selchow & Righter had with deuterium. Using this Technicolor, invented by US
Scrabble snapped it up and were selling process, he and engineer Herbert Kalmus. In
it under yet another name – fellow chemist 1932, it was redesigned to
1931 Scrabble. The letter values Edward Washburn work with three colors. The
were fixed by counting the created the first first full-color movies had
Alfred Butts number of times each letter heavy water. They arrived. Although hampered by
appeared on a page of the published their a huge camera taking three reels
The world’s best known New York Times. discovery in 1932. of film at once, Technicolor was
word game was invented in Scrabble The Scrabble board used for many classics,
1931 by an unemployed New contains 225 squares, of which Button-up including The Wizard of Oz.
York architect, Alfred Butts. shirt
81 are “premium”
High-speed squares that increase 1932
jet of hot a player’s score.
Cecil Gee
gases from the Ailerons
engine pushes control British tailor Cecil
the plane along banking Gee opened his
and turning first shop in 1929
in London. His
Heavy water customers didn’t want
fussy shirts that had to be
1932 pulled on over their head.
Nor did they like separate
Harold Urey, collars attached with fiddly
Edward Washburn studs. So in 1932 Gee
designed a shirt with
Heavy water has the same buttons all the way
chemical properties as down, which could be
ordinary water, but is nearly slipped on like a jacket,
11 percent heavier. This is and also had its collar
sewn in place. After
years of resistance by
traditionalists, Gee’s
design became the
standard men’s shirt.

Full-color
movie

1932

Herbert Kalmus

Several color movie processes
were invented in the early
20th century, but most used
only two colors, giving
unrealistic results. One of these
two-color processes was

1931 The Empire State outdone by taller buildings, but 1932 On May 20–21, the Atlantic Ocean, sealing her
Building, the world’s American aviator reputation as a great pilot. She
tallest skyscraper, is completed in with 102 storys, and a starring Amelia Earhart becomes the first sets a record time of 14 hours,
New York. It will eventually be role in the film King Kong, it will woman to fly nonstop solo across 56 minutes in a Lockheed Vega 5B
remain a tourist attraction.

195

Mars bar Forrest Ernest Walton, and was first of this, ordinary light
Mars played on used successfully in 1932. The microscopes cannot reveal
giant machine gave protons really tiny objects. In 1933,
people’s guilt about enough energy to split up the German engineer Ernst Ruska
eating candy by nuclei of lithium atoms, invented a microscope that
releasing helium nuclei, which worked with much smaller
marketing his new bar are also called alpha particles. waves. The waves were
as a food, pointing out electrons. Although these were
that it contained such Sulfonamide once regarded as particles,
nutritious ingredients as drugs quantum physics (✷ see page
eggs, milk, and butter. 169) shows that they are also
1932 waves. Using them, electron
microscopes can now reveal
Gerhard Domagk objects as small as molecules.

Before antibiotics, Stereophonic
sulfonamides sound
were the only drugs
that could kill a wide 1933
range of bacteria. The
first, Prontosil, was Alan Blumlein,
actually a bright red Harvey Fletcher

dye, discovered in Stereophonic sound was
1932 by German developed independently
on both sides of the Atlantic.
bacteriologist In Britain, engineer Alan
Blumlein, seeking realistic
Mars bar Particle Gerhard Domagk. sound for large-screen films,
accelerator Scientists later realized that obtained a patent covering
1932 this broke down in the body the fundamental principles
1932 to give a more potent drug, of stereophony in 1933. He
Forrest Mars sulfanilamide. From 1936 also developed a microphone
John Cockcroft, onward, after clinical trials technique for stereo recording
The Mars bar started with Ernest Walton by British doctor Leonard and developed the basic
the idea of turning malted Colebrook, this and other system that is used to make
milk into confectionery. In Nuclear physicists can study related “sulfa” drugs began stereophonic discs. In the US,
1922, Forrest Mars suggested the structure of matter by to save thousands of lives. physicist Harvey Fletcher of
this to his father, US candy firing subatomic particles such They are still used today Bell Telephone Laboratories
maker Frank Mars, who created as protons and alpha particles when antibiotics fail. gave his first public
a chocolate-covered nougat (helium nuclei) at other atoms demonstration in 1934,
and caramel bar called Milky to smash them up and see what Electron in New York City.
Way. After an argument with comes out. At first, the microscope
his father, Forrest left for physicists had to use particles FM radio
England in 1932. He set up his emitted naturally by radioactive 1933
own company in Slough, near materials like radium. Today, 1934
London, where he perfected they nearly always use particle Ernst Ruska
the Mars bar, a version of his accelerators, which produce Edwin Armstrong
father’s product cleverly energetic particles artificially. An image cannot contain
adapted to British tastes. The first was built by British detail smaller than the The letters FM on a radio
physicists John Cockcroft and waves used to form it. Because station stand for “frequency
modulation.” This means that
the transmitted frequency goes
up and down slightly with the
ups and downs of the sound
wave it is carrying. It’s more
complicated than the earlier
“amplitude modulation,” or
AM, system, but resists
interference better. FM

1933 US President by means of regular radio 1933 Adolf Hitler is absolute rule of the National
Franklin D. addresses. These “fireside chats” appointed Socialist (Nazi) Party. Violently
Roosevelt begins speaking boost the public’s confidence in Chancellor in Germany. He uses suppressing all opposition, he
directly to the American public their country’s leader his position to establish the establishes himself as a dictator.

196

was perfected in 1934 by US Hammond Cat’s-eyes 1901 – 1950
engineer Edwin Armstrong, organ
who first demonstrated it using 1935 Percy Shaw invented them
a transmitter on top of the 1934 in 1934, but they were not
Empire State Building. Percy Shaw used until the following year.
Laurens Hammond Their secret was in the rubber
Front-wheel Cat’s-eyes are the little that housed the reflectors.
drive car The sound of the Hammond reflectors set in the road Whenever a car ran over a cat’s-
organ comes from lots of which make driving at night eye, a flexible “eyelid” wiped
1934 spinning magnetic wheels, one safer. Possibly inspired by real the reflectors clean, ready for
cats’ eyes, British engineer the next driver. Shaw became
Andrè Citröen, Dual keyboard a millionaire, but never left his
André Lefèbvre allows a Swell pedal hometown in Yorkshire.
controls
Many modern cars have different sound the volume Polyethylene
their engine connected for each hand of sound
to the front wheels, avoiding 1935
lengthy transmission systems
and giving them better grip. Eric Fawcett,
A lot of inventors tried this Reginald Gibson
in the early 20th century, but
the first to succeed in a big Chemists Eric Fawcett
way was French carmaker and Reginald Gibson
Andrè Citröen, whose chief were part of a team at
engineer was André Lefèbvre. British chemical company
Their “traction avant” system ICI. They were investigating
appeared in 1934, and car the reactions of the gas
manufacturers Citröen have ethylene at high pressure.
been making front-wheel In 1935, they found a white,
drive cars ever since. waxy solid in one of their
reaction vessels. It was a new
Hammond organ One of the plastic, polyethylene. It was an
Hammond’s great advantages was excellent insulator and easy to
mold. ICI marketed the new
that it was much smaller than a material in 1939 as Alkathene.
traditional pipe organ. It could
compete with the piano as an Gauge indicates
instrument for the home. gas pressure

Perspex for each note. Teeth on PolyetHylene
the wheels create Chemists Fawcett
1934 pulsating currents in and Gibson used
magnetic coils, and this apparatus in
Rowland Hill, John Crawford these are mixed and their discovery of
amplified to produce polyethylene.
The first thick, clear plastic the final sound. US
available in large sheets engineer Laurens
was Plexiglas. Developed by Hammond built his
German chemist Otto Röhm, first organ in 1934,
it was introduced by the using a constant-speed
Röhm & Haas companies in motor he had invented
Germany and the US in 1931. earlier. Each wheel
The following year two British could have only a
chemists, Rowland Hill and whole number of
John Crawford, discovered teeth, so the scales he
how to make sheets of a got were slightly out of
related, but more glasslike tune. His solution was
material, polymethyl to add a wobble to
methacrylate. Produced by every note, covering
chemical company ICI, it went up the errors while
on sale in 1934 under the more creating the unique
user-friendly name of Perspex. Hammond sound.

1934 “Bollywood,” the Bombay Talkies, in Mumbai. It is 1934 In October, 100,000 Kai-shek. They begin a 6,000 mile
Indian version of the brainchild of Indian producer Chinese communists (9,600 km) “long march” to
Hollywood, gets started with the Himansu Rai and a London-based are driven out of Jiangxi Province safety in Shaanxi. It will take a
opening of a major film studio, Indian playwright, Niranjan Pal. by Guomindang leader Chiang year – and only 8,000 will arrive.

197

InventIons for everyone

Monopoly Radar

1935 1935

Charles Darrow Robert Watson-Watt

This popular board game In 1935, the British
was invented by US heating government, fearing war,
engineer Charles Darrow. He asked Scottish engineer Robert
based it on a less successful Watson-Watt if he could
game invented in 1924 by produce a radio “death ray”.
Elizabeth Phillips. His first Watson-Watt knew that radio
board featured streets in could not destroy enemy
Atlantic City, a favorite vacation aircraft, but thought it might
spot. The tokens – dog, hat, be able to detect them. On
and so on – were copies of February 26, using signals from
charms on his wife’s bracelet. a BBC transmitter, he detected
Manufacturers rejected the a distant bomber. After this,
game at first, but it
finally appeared he supervised the
in time for construction of
Christmas radar stations
1935.
along the English
RadaR coast. These
One detection started working
system helps just as the war with
another: Germany began in
radar used 1939. They helped
to aim a the Royal Air
searchlight Force win the
in 1945. Battle of Britain.
(✷ See also
Seeing by radio.)

Monopoly The British version of Monopoly, with London street names,
appeared in 1936. Its advertising traded on its success in the US.

Color film

1935

Leopold Mannes,
Leopold Godowsky

Color film was invented by
two US classical musicians,
Leopold Mannes and Leopold
Godowsky. Their film had three
separate light-sensitive layers.
Each layer formed an image
in one of the three primary
colors. Although its processing
was complicated, the pictures
it produced were so good that,
in 1930, Kodak invited Mannes
and Godowsky to work in its
research laboratories. The
result, Kodachrome, was
launched on April 15, 1935.

1935 US composer George opera that will come to be 1936 On December 11, of the woman he has been
Gershwin writes his thought of as his greatest work. Britain’s King forbidden to marry, Mrs Wallis
Its lyrics are written by his Edward VIII tells the nation that Simpson. He settles in France
folk opera Porgy and Bess, a elder brother, Ira. he must leave his throne for love and marries her the next year.
unique blend of jazz, pop, and

198