H.M. Small found it difficult to sleep in railway seats in 1889 — so he invented a hammock.
It’s actually possible to sleep at full length if the seat in front is pushed forward — but that might be going too far.
Technology
Rain, Rain
Torontonian John Maguire wasn’t satisfied with the standard raincoat in 1883, so he added a gutter:
The object of the invention is to provide a water-proof coat which can be worn in rainy weather without the wearer’s leg being made wet from water dripping off the skirt of the coat; and it consists of a water-proof coat having the bottom edge of its skirt turned up, forming a trough or channel to receive the water flowing on the surface of the coat, suitable provision being made to carry off the water away from the legs of the wearer of the garment.
“Although the coat is specially designed for gentlemen’s use, it will of course be understood that ladies’ coats may be similarly made.”
Escape Suspenders
In 1885 George C. Hale had the bright idea of weaving a zigzag cord into a pair of suspenders. Now if the wearer is trapped in a burning building, he can free the cord, lower it from a window to receive a rope, and escape to safety.
Hale’s patent application says, “I have found by experimenting that from fifty to one hundred feet, or even more, of the cord can be secured to the suspender in the manner heretofore described.”
The application was granted. I wonder if he ever went into business with this.
Bright Idea
Robert Heath thought we should all wear luminous hats. Confronted with the resounding question Why?, he offered this poetic paragraph:
Among the advantages of the invention are, the facility of seeing and finding the hat, &c., in closets and dark rooms and places, the presentation of a hat, &c., of different shades during day and night, the beautiful appearance of the article when worn at night, and the provision of distinguishing or indicating the localities of those who may wear the hats, &c., whose occupations are dangerous, such as miners, mariners, &c. For persons who are exposed to weather, sea, &c., the head-wear will be suitably waterproofed, so that the self-luminous nature thereof will not be injured by water.
Simple enough. His patent was granted on Feb. 27, 1883.
Green Activism
There must be a story behind this one: In 1900 Ludwig Ederer patented an “alarm bed” to wake an attendant when a greenhouse grows too cold.
If the steam pressure in the boiler drops, the bed suddenly tilts upright, “so that the sleeper will slide or roll off, thus reminding him that the steam within the pipe system is below a certain point, endangering the life of the plants within the greenhouse.”
After he’s stoked the fire the attendant can go back to bed and dream about getting a better job.
Tipu’s Tiger
When British forces plundered the palace of Indian prince Tipu Sultan in May 1799, they found an infuriating trophy:
In a room appropriated for musical instruments was found an article which merits particular notice, as another proof of the deep hate, and extreme loathing of Tippoo Saib towards the English. This piece of mechanism represents a royal Tyger in the act of devouring a prostrate European. There are some barrels in imitation of an Organ, within the body of the Tyger. The sounds produced by the Organ are intended to resemble the cries of a person in distress intermixed with the roar of a Tyger. The machinery is so contrived that while the Organ is playing, the hand of the European is often lifted up, to express his helpless and deplorable condition.
Tipu had allied himself with France against the encroaching East India Company, and the Fourth Mysore War brought his downfall. The tiger, it appears, had symbolized his defiance of British colonialism. The instrument was removed to London, where it became a centerpiece in the Company’s Leadenhall Street gallery; John Keats saw it there and immortalized it in The Cap and Bells, his satirical verse of 1819:
Replied the Page: “that little buzzing noise,
Whate’er your palmistry may make of it,
Comes from a play-thing of the Emperor’s choice,
From a Man-Tiger-Organ, prettiest of his toys.”
“Indeed, the horrific image of a wild beast attacking a helpless fellow Briton must have stirred strong reactions in the British audience so few years after the brutal Mysore campaigns,” write Jane Kromm and Susan Benforado Bakewell in A History of Visual Culture (2010). “Contained within one wondrous work of art was an illustration of the intensity of resentment toward European imperialism, the ferocious power of the enemy prince, and the moral justification for colonization.”
Unquote
“An inventor is simply a fellow who doesn’t take his education too seriously.” — Charles F. Kettering
DO IT NOW
ArnoldC, a language devised by Finnish computer programmer Lauri Hartikka, assigns programming functions to catch phrases from Arnold Schwarzenegger movies. Some keywords:
False: I LIED
True: NO PROBLEMO
If: BECAUSE I’M GOING TO SAY PLEASE
Else: BULLSHIT
EndIf: YOU HAVE NO RESPECT FOR LOGIC
While: STICK AROUND
EndWhile: CHILL
MultiplicationOperator: YOU’RE FIRED
DivisionOperator: HE HAD TO SPLIT
EqualTo: YOU ARE NOT YOU YOU ARE ME
GreaterThan: LET OFF SOME STEAM BENNET
Or: CONSIDER THAT A DIVORCE
And: KNOCK KNOCK
DeclareMethod: LISTEN TO ME VERY CAREFULLY
MethodArguments: I NEED YOUR CLOTHES YOUR BOOTS AND YOUR MOTORCYCLE
Return: I’LL BE BACK
EndMethodDeclaration: HASTA LA VISTA, BABY
AssignVariableFromMethodCall: GET YOUR ASS TO MARS
ReadInteger: I WANT TO ASK YOU A BUNCH OF QUESTIONS AND I WANT TO HAVE THEM ANSWERED IMMEDIATELY
AssignVariable: GET TO THE CHOPPER
SetValue: HERE IS MY INVITATION
EndAssignVariable: ENOUGH TALK
ParseError: WHAT THE FUCK DID I DO WRONG
This program prints the string “hello world”:
IT'S SHOWTIME TALK TO THE HAND "hello world" YOU HAVE BEEN TERMINATED
A Human Cantilever
To illustrate the design principle behind Scotland’s Forth Bridge, engineer Sir Benjamin Baker offered a personal demonstration. Sir John Fowler (left) and Baker (right) each hold two wooden poles with outstretched arms, forming two diamond shapes. When construction foreman Kaichi Watanabe sits in the center, the diamonds are prevented from tipping inward because their outer ends are anchored.
It worked. The bridge, opened in 1890, held the record as the world’s longest single cantilever bridge span for 17 years.
Chebyshev’s Paradoxical Mechanism
Russian mathematician Pafnuty Chebyshev devised this puzzling mechanisms in 1888. Turning the crank handle once will send the flywheel through two revolutions in the same direction, or four revolutions in the opposite direction. (A better video is here.)
“What is so unusual in this mechanism is the ability of the linkages to flip from one configuration to the other,” write John Bryant and Chris Sangwin in How Round Is Your Circle? (2011). “In most linkage mechanisms such ambiguity is implicitly, or explicitly, designed out so that only one choice for the mathematical solution can give a physical configuration. … This mechanism is really worth constructing, if only to confound your friends and colleagues.”
(Thanks, Dre.)