The patent office awards U.S. Patent No. 743,801 to a
Birmingham, Alabama woman named Mary Anderson
for her “window cleaning device for electric cars and
other vehicles to remove snow, ice or sleet from the
window.”
When she received her patent, Anderson tried to sell
it to a Canadian manufacturing firm, but the company
refused: The device had no practical value, it said, and
so was not worth any money.
Though mechanical windshield wipers were standard
equipment in passenger cars by around 1913, Anderson
never profited from the invention.
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