List of United States inventions

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American inventors have made many advances since the 18th century. This is a list of key American inventions.

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1794 Cotton Gin Eli Whitney patents his machine to comb and deseed bolls of cotton. His invention makes possible a revolution in the cotton industry and the rise of "King Cotton" as the main cash crop in the South, but will never make him rich. Instead of buying his machine, farmers built bogus versions of their own. Also lead to the increasing want/need for slave labour.

1801 Steam-Powered Pumping Station The Fairmount Water Works harnesses steam power to provide water for the city of Philadelphia.

1803 Spray Gun Dr. Alan de Vilbiss of Toledo, Ohio, invented this device to replace swabs as the method of applying medication to oral and nasal passages.

1805 Self Propelled Amphibious vehicle Oliver Evans' "Orukter Amphibolos" dredges the waters near the Philadelphia docks. Its steam-powered engine drove either wooden wheels or a paddle wheel. Evans demonstrated his machine in Philadelphia's Center Square, where he passed the hat for money.

1806 Coffee Pot Coffee drinkers the world over no longer have to chew their brew. Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford, invents a coffee pot with a metal sieve to strain away the grounds.

1817 Erie Canal Overland travel in the 1800s is slow and arduous. Engineers propose a plan to supplement natural water systems by digging a 363 mile canal to connect the Hudson River with Lake Erie. The "Seneca Chief" made the inaugural run through the Erie Canal in 1825.

1818 Profile Lathe Thomas Blanchard of Middlebury, Connecticut, builds a woodworking lathe that does the work of 13 men. His invention helps to lower wood prices.

1831 Reaping Machine The McCormick Reaper, which cut grain much faster than a man with a scythe, failed to catch on. McCormick sold the first unit around 1840; by 1844, only 50 had sold. After taking his operation to Chicago, McCormick prospered. By 1871 his company was selling 10,000 reapers per year.

1833 Sewing Machine Walter Hunt invents the first lock-stitch sewing machine, but loses interest and does not patent his invention. Later, Elias Howe secures patent on an original lock-stitch machine, but fails to manufacture and sell it. Still later, Isaac Singer infringes on Howe's patent to make his own machine, which makes Singer rich. Hunt also invents the safety pin, which he sells outright for $400.

1834 Threshing Machine John A. and Hiram Abial Pitts invent a machine that automatically threshes and separates grain from chaff, freeing farmers from a slow and laborious process.

1836 Revolver To finance the development of his "six shooter," Samuel Colt traveled the lecture circuit, giving demonstrations of laughing gas. Colt's new weapon failed to catch on, and he went bankrupt in 1842 at age 28. He reorganized and sold his first major order to the War Department during the Mexican War in 1846, and went on to become rich.

1837 Power Tools Thomas Davenport of Brandon, Vermont, is one of the first to find a practical application for the electric motor. He uses a motor he built to power shop machinery and also builds the first electric model railroad car.

1840 Paint Tube John Rand invents a collapsible metal squeeze tube. The container immediately hits markets in Europe, where it is used to hold and dispense artists' pigments.

1842 Ether Anesthesia Crawford Williamson Long, of Jefferson, Georgia, performs the first operation using an ether-based anesthesia, when he removes a tumor from the neck of Mr. James Venable. Long will not reveal his discovery until 1849.

1846 Cylinder Printing Press Richard M. Hoe creates a revolution in printing by rolling a cylinder over stationary plates of inked type and using the cylinder to make an impression on paper. This eliminated the need for making impressions directly from the type plates themselves, which were heavy and difficult to maneuver.

1857 Passenger Elevator Elisha Graves Otis dramatically demonstrates his passenger elevator at the Crystal Palace Exposition in New York by cutting the elevator's cables as it ascends a 300 foot tower. Otis' unique safety braking system prevents the elevator from falling; his business prospects rise.

1858 Burglar Alarm Edwin T. Holmes of Boston begins to sell electric burglar alarms. Later, his workshop will be used by Alexander Graham Bell as the young Bell pursues his invention of the telephone. Holmes will be the first person to have a home telephone.

1859 Oil Well Drilling at Titusville, Pennsylvania, "Colonel" Edwin Drake strikes oil at a depth of 69.5 feet. Prior to that, oil, which had been used mostly as a lubricant and lamp fuel, had been obtained only at places where it seeped from the ground. Western Pennsylvania witnesses the world's first oil boom.

1860 Repeating Rifle B. Tyler Henry, chief designer for Oliver Fisher Winchester's arms company, adapts a breech-loading rifle invented by Walter B. Hunt and creates a new lever action repeating rifle. First known as the Henry, the rifle will soon be famous as simply the Winchester.

1861 Modern Pin Tumbler Lock Linus Yale Jr. improved upon his father's original design (patented in 1848) in 1861, using a smaller, flat key with serrated edges that is the basis of modern pin-tumbler locks.

1863 Roller Skates James Plimpton of Medford, Massachusetts, gives the world the first practical four-wheeled roller skate. This sets off a roller craze that quickly spreads across the U.S. and Europe.

1865 Web Offset Printing William Bullock introduced a printing press that could feed paper on a continuous roll and print both sides of the paper at once. Used first by the Philadelphia Ledger, the machine would become an American standard. It would also kill its maker, who died when he accidentally fell into one of his presses.

1867 Barbed Wire Farmer Henry Rose, invents the product that will close down the open cattle ranges by closing in cattle onto individual plots of privately owned land. I.L. Ellwood and Company's Glidden Steel Barb Wire will dominate the market; by 1890 the open range will be only a memory.

1870 Pneumatic Subway Working in secret to hide his operation from Boss Tweed, who opposes it, Scientific American publisher Alfred Ely Beach builds a pneumatic subway under Broadway in New York. Beach's single subway car, which features upholstered chairs and chandeliers is driven along the 300 foot tunnel by a 100 horsepower blower.

1875 Electric Dental Drill George F. Green of Kalamazoo, Michigan invented an electric powered device to drill teeth.

1875 Mimeograph While using paraffin in an attempt to invent and improve telegraphy tape, Thomas Alva Edison discovers a way to make duplicate copies of documents instead.

1880 Hearing Aid R.G. Rhodes improves on the ear trumpet with another primitive hearing aid. The device is a thin sheet of hard rubber or cardboard placed against teeth which conducts vibrations to the auditory nerve.

1882 Electric Fan Dr. Schuyler Skaats Wheeler invented the two-bladed desk fan, which is produced by the Crocker and Curtis electric motor company.

1885 Skyscraper After the Great Fire of 1871, Chicago has become a magnet for daring experiments in architecture. William Le Baron Jenney completes the 10-story Home Insurance Company Building, the first to use steel-girder construction; more than twenty skyscrapers will be built in Chicago over the next 9 years.

1887 "Platter" Record Edison's tube recording system produces distorted sound because of gravity's pressure on the playing stylus. Emile Berliner, a German immigrant living in Washington, DC, invents a process for recording sound on a horizontal disc. The "platter" record is born.

1888 Kodak Camera In Rochester, New York, George Eastman introduces a hand-held box camera for portable use. The camera is pre-loaded with 100 exposure film; after shooting the photographer returns the whole camera to the manufacturer for development and a reload.

1891 Escalator Jesse W. Reno, introduces a new novelty ride at Coney Island. His moving stairway elevates passengers on a conveyor belt at an angle of 25 degrees. The device will be shown at the Paris Exposition of 1900, where it is called the escalator.

1896 Automatic Hat James Boyle, of Washington, invents a hat that tips automatically.

1901 Safety Razor King Camp Gillette, former traveling hardware salesman of Fond du Lac, invents double-edged safety razor. By the end of 1904, he will have sold 90,000 razors and 12,400,000 blades, but he will die in 1932 with his dream of a utopian society organized by engineers unrealized.

1911 Self Starter Charles F. Kettering, who developed the electric cash register while working at National Cash Register, sells his electric automobile starters to the Cadillac company. This device increases the popularity of the gasoline-powered car, which no longer needs to be started with a hand crank.

1921 Wirephoto The first electronically-transmitted photograph is sent by Western Union. The idea for a facsimile transmission was first proposed by Scottish clockmaker Alexander Bain in 1843.

1924 Gas Chamber Execution In an effort to make capital punishment more humane, the State of Nevada introduces death by gas chamber. Convicted murderer Gee John takes 6 minutes to die.

1929 Frozen Food Clarence Birdseye offers his quick-frozen foods to the public. Birdseye got the idea during fur-trapping expeditions to Labrador in 1912 and 1916, where he saw the natives use freezing to preserve foods.

1931 Radio Astronomy While trying to track down a source of electrical interference on telephone transmissions, Karl Guthe Jansky of Bell Telephone Laboratories discovers radio waves emanating from stars in outer space.

1937 Chair Lift James Curran build a chair lift for the Dollar Mountain resort in Sun Valley, Idaho. Dollar Mountain follows with an order for six more.

1938 Nylon A team of researchers working under Wallace H. Carothers at E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Company invents a plastic that can be drawn into strong, silk-like fibers. Nylon will soon become popular as a fabric for hosiery as well as industrial applications such as cordage.

1942 Defibrillator Dr. Claude Beck develops a device for jump-starting the heart with a burst of electricity.

1947 Polaroid Camera Dr. Edwin H. Land introduces a new camera that can produce a developed photographic image in sixty seconds. Land will follow in the 1960s with a color model and eventually receive more than 500 patents for his innovations in light and plastics technologies.

1953 Heart-lung Machine Dr. John H. Gibbon performs the first successful open heart surgery in which the blood is artificially circulated and oxygenated by a heart-lung machine. This new technology, which allows the surgeon to operate on a dry and motionless heart, greatly increases surgical treatment options for heart defects and disease.

1955 Nuclear Submarine The Nautilus, the first nuclear submarine, revolutionizes naval warfare. Conventional submarines need two engines: a diesel engine to travel on the surface and an electric engine to travel submerged, where oxygen for a diesel engine is not available. The Nautilus, the first nuclear sub, can travel many thousands of miles below the surface with a single fuel charge.

1957 Polio Vaccine Dr. Jonas Salk develops a polio vaccine using strains of polio too weak to cause infection but strong enough to activate the human immune system.

1960 Laser Working at Hughes Research Laboratories, physicist Theodore H. Maiman creates the first laser. The core of his laser consists of a man-made ruby -- a material that had been judged unsuitable by other scientists, who rejected crystal cores in favor of various gases.

1964 Operating System IBM rolls out the OS/360, the first mass-produced computer operating system. Using the OS/360, all computers in the IBM 360 family could run any software program. Already IBM is a giant in the computer industry, controlling 70% of the market worldwide.

1965 Minicomputer Digital Equipment introduces the PDP-8, the world's first computer to use integrated circuit technology. Because of its relatively small size and its low $18,000 price tag, Digital sells several hundred units.

1970 Optical Fiber Corning Glass announces it has created a glass fiber so clear that it can communicate pulses of light. GTE and AT&T will soon begin experiments to transmit sound and image data using fiber optics, which will transform the communications industry.

1974 Product Barcode The first shipments of bar-coded products arrive in American stores. Scanners at checkout stations read the codes using laser technology. The hand-punched keyboard cash register takes one step closer to obsolescence.

1979 Human-Powered Flight Cyclist Byron Allen crosses the English Channel in a pedal-powered aircraft called the Gossamer Albatross. The flight takes 2 hours, 49 minutes, and wins a £100,000 prize for its crew, headed by designer Dr. Paul MacCready. Constructed of Mylar, polystyrene, and carbon-fiber rods, the Albatross has a wingspan of 93 feet 10 inches and weighs about 70 pounds.

1981 Space Shuttle For the first time, NASA successfully launches and lands its reusable spacecraft, the Space Shuttle. The shuttle can be used for a number of applications, including launch, retrieval, and repair of satellites and as a laboratory for physical experiments. While extremely successful, the shuttle program will suffer a disaster in 1986 when the shuttle Challenger explodes after takeoff, killing all on board.

1982 Artificial Heart Dr. Robert Jarvik implants a permanent artificial heart, the Jarvik 7, into Dr. Barney Clark. The heart, powered by an external compressor, keeps Clark alive for 112 days.

1988 Graphic User Interface Apple creates the first modern GUI.