miles electric elevator patent drawing
Throughout history dating as far back as the 1800s, blacks (African Americans) have been responsible for either inventing or significantly improving upon various inventions without the due recognition.
Several African American kids are growing up thinking that black people are only exceptional in sports and entertainment. It should be also noted that mainstream press can always find time to highlight the short-comings of the few high profile blacks without the same attention afforded to their accomplishments.
Thisinventionisblack seeks to highlight as many of the accomplishments as we can find to educate all kids about African American people and their contributions to our society.
Did you know these black inventions?
On February 5, 1884, W. Johnson patented a spring-like whisk device made of wires and a handle that today is used to help mix ingredients. Johnson’s eggbeater changed the way ingredients are mixed together from the time-consuming hand-mixing that was quite labor-intensive.
On March 17, 1896, C.B. Brooks designed and patented the street sweeper to clean the streets mechanically rather than teams of workers having to pick up the trash by hand or sweep it with hand-held brooms. As cities grew larger and more trash accumulated on our streets, the street sweeper is now an indispensable tool to keep our environment clean.
On November 23, 1897, J.L. Love developed and patented the pencil sharpener out of complete frustration for having to use his knife to repeatedly shave off thin slices of wood from his pencil in order to make a new point to write his notes and letters. Love’s pencil sharpener consisted of a crank and roter that was used to shave off the slices of wood until a point was created.
On October 11, 1887, Alexander Miles of Duluth, MN patented an electrical elevator that improved upon the existing elevators that required patrons to manually shutoff the access door to the elevator shafts. While Alexander Miles did not invent the elevator, his improvement to create an automatic mechanism to close the access door to the elevator shaft resulted in fewer accidents. Often people would forget to close the access door that leads to the elevator shaft and people would accidentally plunged down the shafts and be seriously injured.
