The Progress of Invention in the Nineteenth Century Part 32

Look around the room, and there is not a thing in sight that does not suggest the material advance of the age; the books, the furniture, the carpets, the curtains, the wall paper, the clock, the mantels, the house tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs, the culinary utensils, and the clothing, all represent creations of this century. So full is the daily life of these things, and so much of a necessity have they all become, that their commonplace character dismisses them from conspicuous notice. Take the most matter-of-fact and prosy half hour of the day, that at the time of rising, and see what a faithful account of the average man's everyday life would present. The awakening is definitely determined by an alarm clock, and the sleepy Nineteenth Century man rolling over under the seductive comfort of a spring bed, takes another nap, because he knows that the rapid transit cars will give him time to spare. Rising a little later his bare feet find a comfortable footing on a machine-made rug, until thrust into full fashioned hose, and ensconced in a pair of machine-sewed slippers. Drawing the loom-made lace curtains, he starts up the window shade on the automatic Hartshorn roller and is enabled to see how to put in his collar b.u.t.ton and adjust his shirt studs. He awakens the servant below with an electric bell, calls down the speaking tube to order breakfast, and perhaps lights the gas for her by the push b.u.t.ton. He then proceeds to the bath, where hot and cold water, the sanitary closet, a gas heater, and a great array of useful modern articles present themselves, such as vaseline, witch hazel, dentifrices, cold cream, soaps and antiseptics, which supply every luxurious want and every modern conception of sanitation. His bath concluded, he proceeds to dress, and maybe puts in his false teeth, or straps on an artificial leg. Donning his shirt with patented gussets and bands, he quickly adjusts his separable cuff b.u.t.tons, puts on his patented suspenders, and, winding a stem-winding watch, proceeds down stairs to breakfast. A revolving fly brush and fly screens contribute to his comfort. A cup of coffee from a drip coffee-pot, a lump of artificial ice in his tumbler, sausage ground in a machine, batter cakes made with an egg beater, waffles from a patented waffle iron, honey in artificial honey comb, cream raised by a centrifugal skimmer, b.u.t.ter made in a patented churn, hot biscuits from the cooking range, and a refrigerator with a well stocked larder, all help to make him comfortable and happy. The picture is not exceptional in its fullness of invented agencies, and one could just as well go on with our citizen through the rest of the day's experience, and start him off after breakfast with a patented match, in a patented match case, and a patented cigarette, with his patented overshoes and umbrella, and send him along over the patented pavement to the patented street car, or automobile, and so on to the end of the day.

Some of the minor inventions are really of too much importance to be pa.s.sed without comment. The _cable car_ is a factor which has cut no small figure in the activities of city life. The first patent on a slotted underground conduit between the rails, with traction cable inside and running on pulleys, was that to E. A. Gardner, No. 19,736, March 23, 1858. Hallidie, in San Francisco, in 1876, directed his energies to a development of this system, and brought it to a degree of perfection and general adoption that made it for many years the leading system of street car propulsion. To-day, however, it represents but a decadent type, being largely supplanted by the superior advantages of electricity.

_Pa.s.senger elevators_ const.i.tute one of the conspicuous features of modern locomotion. Without them the tall office buildings, hotels, and department stores would have no existence; the Eiffel Tower would never have been dreamed of, and the expenditure of vital force in stair climbing would have been greatly augmented. The pa.s.senger elevator has for its prototype the ancient hoist or lift for mines, but in the latter half of the Nineteenth Century it has developed into a distinct inst.i.tution--a luxurious little room, gliding noiselessly up and down, actuated by a power that is not seen, and supplied with every appliance for safety and comfort, such as governors, safety catches, automatic stops, mirrors and cushioned seats. The principle of the screw, of balance weights, of the lazy tongs, and other mechanical powers have each found application in the elevator, but steam, hydraulic power, and electricity const.i.tute the moving agencies of the modern type. The patent to E. G. Otis, No. 31,128, January 15, 1861, marks the beginning of its useful applications.

Of close kin to the elevator are the _fire escape_, _dumb waiter_ and _grain elevator_, each of which fills a more or less important function in the life of to-day.

What more ubiquitous or ingenious ill.u.s.tration of modern progress than the _American stem winding watch!_ Up to the middle of the century all watches were made by hand throughout. Each watch had its own individuality as a separate creation, and only the privileged few were able to carry them. In 1848 Aaron L. Dennison, a Boston watch maker, began making watches by machinery, and the foundation of the system of interchangeable parts was laid. A small factory at Roxbury, Ma.s.s., was established in 1850, which four years later was moved to Waltham. In 1857 it pa.s.sed into the hands of Appleton, Tracy & Co., and was subsequently acquired by the American Watch Co. As presenting some idea of the great elaboration involved in this art, it was estimated a few years ago that 3,746 distinct mechanical operations were required to make an ordinary machine made watch. A single pound of steel wire is sometimes converted into a couple of hundred thousand tiny screws, and another pound of fine steel wire furnishes 17,280 hair springs, worth several thousand dollars. The absolute uniformity and perfect interchangeability of parts in the American watch have been obtained by subst.i.tuting the invariable and mathematical accuracy of the machine for the nervous fingers and dimming eyes of the old time watchmaker, and the American machine made watch, discredited as it was at first, stands to-day the greatest modern advance in horology.

_Friction Matches._--In 1805 Thenard, of Paris, made the first attempt to utilize chemical agencies for the ordinary production of fire. In 1827 John Walker, an English druggist, made friction matches called "congreves." In 1833 phosphorus friction matches were introduced on a commercial scale by Preschel, of Vienna. In 1845 red phosphorus matches (parlor matches) were made by Von Schrotter, of Vienna, and in 1855 safety matches, which ignited only on certain substances, were made by Lundstrom, of Sweden. Prior to the Nineteenth Century, and in fact until about 1833, the old flint and steel and tinder box were the clumsy and uncertain means for producing fire. To-day the friction match is turned out by automatic machinery by the million, and const.i.tutes probably the most ubiquitous and useful of all the minor inventions.

Step into any of the great department stores and the genius of the inventor confronts you in the _cash carrier_ whisking its little cars back and forth from the cashier's desk to the most remote corners of the great building. The first of these mechanical carriers adapted for store service was patented by D. Brown, July 13, 1875, No. 165,473. Not until about 1882, however, was there any noticeable adoption of the system, when practical development was given in Martin's patents, No. 255,525, March 28, 1882; No. 276,441, April 24, 1883, and No. 284,456, September 4, 1883. Go to the lunch counter, and the _cash register_ reminds you that the millenium of absolute honesty is not yet realized. The _bell punch_ on the street car and the burglar proof safe with its _combination locks_ are other suggestions in the same line. The first _fire proof safe_ is disclosed in the British patent to Richard Scott, No. 2,477, of 1801. The _time lock_, which prevents the safe from being opened by anyone except at a certain period of daylight, was invented by J. V. Savage, and was covered by him in United States patent No. 5,321, October 9, 1847. The practical adoption of time locks began about 1875 with the operations of Sargent, Stockwell and others, and to-day they const.i.tute one of the most important features of bank safes and vaults, and represent a marvelously beautiful and accurate example of mechanical skill.

The Otto _gas-engine_, and the Ericsson _air-engine_ are important developments in power producing motors, and the improvements in _pavements_ and in _street sweepers_ for cleaning them, contribute to the cleanliness, sanitation, and aesthetic values of city life. The _cigarette machine_, which continuously curls a ribbon of paper around a core of tobacco to form a rope, and then cuts it off into cigarettes, is an important invention in the tobacco industry, however doubtful its hygienic value to the world may be. The _lightning rod_ has brought protection to homes and lives, and the _incubator_ has become the hen's wet nurse. In agriculture, the reaper has been supplemented with threshing machines, seeders, drills, cultivators, horse rakes and plows.

In the farm yard appear the improved carriage and wagon, the well pump, the wind wheel, the fruit drier, the bee hive, and the cotton and cider press. In the kitchen, the washing machine, the churn, the cheese press, ironing machine, wringer, the rat trap, and fruit jar. In the house, the folding bed, tilting chair, carpet sweeper, and the piano. In heating appliances, steam and water heating systems, base burning and Latrobe stoves, hot air furnaces, gas and oil stoves. In plastics there are brick machines, pressed gla.s.s ware, enameled sheet iron ware, tiles, paper buckets, celluloid and rubber articles. In hydraulics there are rams, water closets, pumps, and turbine water wheels. In mining there are stamp mills, ore crushers, separators, concentrators, and amalgamators. In the leather and boot and shoe industry there is a great variety of machines and appliances. The paper industry, with book binding machines, and paper box machines, is a fertile field of invention. Steam boilers, metallurgical appliances, soap making, chemical fire extinguishers, fountain pens, the sand blast, bottle stoppers, and a thousand other things present themselves in miscellaneous and endless array. These are, however, only some of the things which the limitation of s.p.a.ce precludes from individual treatment, but which are none the less important in making up the great resources of modern life, and, for the most part, represent the contributions of the Nineteenth Century not heretofore considered.

The observant and thoughtful reader finds just here occasion to inquire the meaning of this great rising tide of progress which has so distinguished the Nineteenth Century. It is largely due to the Patent Law, which justly regards the inventor as a public benefactor, and seeks to make for him some protection in the enjoyment of his rights. If a man be in the possession of a legacy by the accident of birth, the law of inheritance rules that it is rightfully his. The finding of a thing, whether by jetsam, flotsam, or the lucky accident of a first discovery, this also makes good his t.i.tle, if there be no other owner. There is, however, a right of property which is higher than all others, and in which there is coupled with the possession of the thing the sacred function of its creation. The right of a mother to her child is of this nature, and like unto it is the right of the inventor to the creation of his genius. In the last two centuries of the world's history this right has been recognized by an enlightened civilization, and provision made for its enjoyment in the grant of patents, and if there be any right more strongly entrenched than another in the eternal verities of equity and justice it is this. Our first crude patent law was enacted in 1790, but not until 1836 was the present system adopted. Our own and comparatively new country has, therefore, not yet had a hundred years of existence under our present Patent System, and yet to-day it outstrips the world both in its material resources and in its wealth of patented inventions. The accompanying diagram, Fig. 306, ill.u.s.trates in a graphic way just what relation the United States bears to the other leading countries of the world in the matter of patents granted, and when it is remembered that under our system a patent can only be granted for a new invention, while in some of the other countries it is not essential to the grant, the richness in invention of the United States, with its six hundred and fifty thousand patents, can be better appreciated. This is a greater number than has been issued by Great Britain and France put together. Connecticut is the most productive State in invention in proportion to its people, and Edison is the most prolific inventor. From 1870 to 1900 he has taken 727 United States patents, and there are from twenty-five to thirty other American inventors each of whom has taken 100 or more patents.

[Ill.u.s.tration: TOTAL NUMBER PATENTS TO JAN 1^{ST.} 1900

(FOREIGN PATENTS FOR 1899, ESTIMATED)

RATE OF ISSUE OF U.S. PATENTS

FIG. 306.]

The year 1790 was notable in two events, the birth of our patent system and the death of Benjamin Franklin. That grand old philosopher, with a prescience of future greatness to come from the genius of the inventor, is said to have expressed the wish before he died that he might be sealed up in a cask of old Madeira and be brought to life a hundred years in the future, that he might witness the growth of the world. Who can tell what his emotions would be if he were with us to-day? It is said, when he first saw the fibres of the string diverge, and the spark pa.s.s from the cord of his kite, and the lightning was for the first time obedient to the will of man, that he uttered a deep sigh and wished that that moment were his last. To this poor knowledge of electricity he would now have added all the wonders and powers of the telegraph, the dynamo, the telephone, and the great modern electrical science; to his primitive hand press he would have contrasted the Octuple perfecting press, turning out papers at the rate of 1,600 a minute; his modest type-setting case would be replaced by a great array of linotype machines, and he would find several acres of woodland sacrificed to produce the wood-pulp paper of a single edition of a New York daily.

Would he not realize indeed that truth is stranger than fiction, and fact more wonderful than fancy's dream!

CHAPTER x.x.xV.

EPILOGUE.

Whatever the future centuries may bring in new and useful inventions, certain it is that the Nineteenth Century stands pre-eminent in this field of human achievement, so far excelling all other like periods as to establish on the pages of history an epoch as remarkable as it is unique. Never before has human conception so expressed itself in materialized embodiment, never has thought been so fruitfully wedded to the pregnant possibilities of matter, never has the divine function of creation been so closely approximated, never has such an accretion of helpful instrumentalities and material resources been added to the world's wealth--not merely the miserly and inert wealth of gold and gems, but the wealth of an enlarged human existence. This life itself is but a limited span; beginning in infancy, expanding to highest achievement in middle age, and declining at the end, it quickly pa.s.ses away, and another generation follows. Growth and decay with all living things mark the immutable law of nature, and the inevitable fate of mortality. The rose blossoms into beauty, fades, and decays. The bird in the air, and the beast in the field, each plays his part and pa.s.ses to the great unknown, leaving no record; man himself is mortal, but his work is immortal. The inspired conception of his best thought, the materialized embodiment of his work in useful agencies, and the subjugation of the laws of nature to his service, all endure and live forever in his inventions. These partake of the breath of life, and in their immortality are of kin to the soul. Cities may grow up and vanish, civilizations may decay, and man himself may degenerate, but the principle of the lever and the screw, once discovered, is for all time perfect, invariable and immortal. Every invention made is another permanent gift to posterity. All of enduring wealth that the present gets from the past are its ideas reduced to a working basis. All else is but dross, or evanescent dreams which vanish into oblivion in the light of a larger knowledge. But ideas wrought into practical, substantive things, tried and proven true, these are inventions--immortal creations--and of these the Nineteenth Century has borne fruit in paramount abundance, and this legacy it now bequeaths to the coming century.

To follow conventional methods, the final chapter of a book should be an "In conclusion" with a "finis" and a dismantled torch, but the history of invention will ever be a continued story. There is no end in this field. The trusteeship of the Twentieth Century man is great, and great his responsibilities; but his restless and dominant spirit knows no decadence, and his mental endowment and material equipment, without parallel in history, are a guarantee of future achievements. Will not the chemist learn how to produce electricity direct from the combustion of coal, or solve the problem of the synthesis of food? Will not the American continent be parted by an inter-oceanic ca.n.a.l, or the rough waters of the English Channel be avoided with a submarine tunnel? May not a ship ca.n.a.l through France to the Mediterranean give to that country the connected enjoyment of riparian rights, without pa.s.sing the frowning battlements of Gibraltar, or might not a tunnel under the Straits of Gibraltar put Europe and Africa in direct railway communication? The relation of electricity to life is a field of pregnant possibilities, and may we not also learn to swap the surplus heat of summer for the winter's cold, and by an equalization of their two extremes bring eternal spring and joy to the animated world? Shall we not yet stand on the North Pole, or looking away into s.p.a.ce may we not extend a neighborly welcome to our brothers in Mars, if any there be? It is permitted to dream in this field, for it is this reaching out into the unknown that plats the boundaries of an extended world, and adds to the possessions of man.

The old man in his dreams of the past rejoices in his achievements, for he has stolen the fires of Prometheus and forged anew the thunderbolts of Jove for the arts of peace. Delving into the secret recesses of the earth, he has tapped the hidden supplies of nature's fuel, has invaded her treasure house of gold and silver, robbed Mother Earth of her h.o.a.rded stores, and possessed himself of her family record, finding on the pages of geology sixty millions of years' existence. Peering into the invisible little world, the infinite secrets of microcosm have yielded their fruitful and potent knowledge of bacteria and cell growth.

Pain has been robbed of its terrors by anaesthesia; the heat of the sun has been brought down in the electric furnace, and the cold of inter-stellar s.p.a.ce in the ice machine and liquid air. With telescope and spectroscope he has climbed into limitless s.p.a.ce above, and defined the size, distance, and const.i.tution of a star millions of miles away.

The north star has been made his sentinel on the sea. The lightning is made his swift messenger, and thought flashes in submarine depths around the world. Dead matter is made to speak in the phonograph, the invisible has been revealed in the X-Rays, coal has been made his black slave, steam the breath of the world's life, and all of nature's forces have been made his constant servants in attendance.

With such a retrospect, the sage of the Nineteenth Century may lie down to quiet rest, with an a.s.suring faith that what G.o.d hath wrought is good, and what is not may yet be.

THE END.