Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847 – October 18, 1931)
Thomas Edison was born in 1847 in Milan, Ohio, but
grew up in Port Huron, Michigan.
Early in his career he worked as a telegraph operator,
which inspired some of his earliest inventions.
In 1876, he established his first laboratory facility in
Menlo Park, New Jersey.
Duct tape is born when Vesta Stoudt (1891 – 1966) a
factory worker packing WWII munitions, writes FDR
outlining—with drawings—her idea to replace weak
paper packing tape with a tougher waterproof cloth
version. Impressed, FDR pushed her idea into
production.
(September 15, 1846 – August 21, 1910)
On this day in 1899, George F. Grant, an African American
dentist from Boston, received US Patent number 638,920
for the world’s first golf tee.
Neither a marketer nor an inventor, Grant, who was also
the first African-American professor at Harvard, gave
away a few copies of his creation but made no money
from it before he died.
The question, taken from the Bible (Numbers 23:23), had been
suggested to Morse by Annie Ellworth, the daughter of the
commissioner of patents.
Annie G. Ellsworth
On May 8, 1886, Dr. John Pemberton (above) brought his
perfected syrup to Jacobs’ Pharmacy in downtown Atlanta
where the first glass of Coca‑Cola was poured.
Initially, the drink was marketed as a medicinal tonic called
“French Wine Coca.”
Serving about nine drinks per day in its first year, Coca‑Cola
was an exciting new drink in the beginning.
