For thousands of years, humans coped with heat by harvesting and storing natural ice and devising natural cooling systems that utilized ventilation and evaporation. By the mid 1800s, people began developing huge refrigeration machines to manufacture ice. By the early 1900s, engineers developed electric domestic refrigerators, which by 1927 were affordable convenient household appliances.By then, an increasingly sophisticated public demanded more modern-looking appliances than engin...

As the Great Depression started in 1929, several dozen creative individuals from a variety of artistic fields, including theatre, advertising, graphics, fashion and furniture design, pioneered a new profession. Responding to unprecedented public and industry demand for new styles, these artists entered the industrial world during what was called the "Machine Age," to introduce "modern design" to the external appearance and form of mass-produced, functional, mechanical consumer products for...

House cleaning has been an innate human activity forever but only since the early 19th century have mechanical devices replaced the physical labor (performed mostly by women). Mechanical carpet sweepers were replaced by manual suction cleaners, which in turn were replaced by electric vacuum cleaners in the early 20th century. Innovative inventors, who improved vacuum cleaners as electricity became commonly available, made these advances possible. Many early manufacturers failed, but some, ...

Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize ** A Wall Street Journal Best Book of the YearRust has been called “the great destroyer,” the “pervasive menace,” and “the evil.” “This look at corrosion—its causes, its consequences, and especially the people devoted to combating it—is wide-ranging and consistently engrossing” (The New York Times).It is the hidden enemy, the one that challenges the very basis of civil...

Open a copy of the Information Please Almanac and turn to the chapter on famous people. 4000 names and you won't know hardly any. But what about names everyone knows? Pillsbury, Maytag, Kellogg. Nowhere to be found. How many names are more famous than Howard Johnson or Oscar Mayer? But who were these folks? Let's look at the men behind the names we see when we look around our house.

Change the way you look at office supplies forever with this wonderfully enlightening and quirky exploration of the fascinating backstories of everyday objects, such as the humble and perfectly designed paper clip and the utilitarian, irreplaceable pencil.How many of humanity’s brightest ideas started out on a scrap of paper or in the margins of a notebook? In a delightfully witty and fresh voice, James Ward—cofounder of the Boring Conference and c...

Henry Petroski traces the origins of the pencil back to ancient Greece and Rome, writes factually and charmingly about its development over the centuries and around the world, and shows what the pencil can teach us about engineering and technology today.

The first plain-paper office copier -- which was introduced in 1960 and has been called the most successful product ever marketed in America -- is unusual among major high-technology inventions in that its central process was conceived by a single person. David Owen's fascinating narrative tells the story of the machine nobody thought we needed but now we can't live without.Chester Carlson grew up in unspeakable poverty, worked his way through junior college and th...

Trash Backwards: Innovating Our Way to Zero Waste examines the various kinds of trash Americans are producing in staggering quantities, and profiles a range of innovative processes, people, and companies who are thinking creatively about how to not just reduce pressure on landfills, but redefine what’s possible in the realm of recycling. This E-ssential offers insights into the motivations and inspirations of people working on cutting edge processes of waste management and land re...

Learn the art of ceramics with a master!Step into the studio with master artist Robin Hopper as he opens the door to his more than 50-year exploration of ceramics in Robin Hopper Ceramics.Discover the "hows" and "whys" behind Robin's artistry while he shares his innovative insight, personal reflection and life's work. Robin Hopper Ceramics paints an intriguing self-portrait of the man within the legendary artist, teacher and arts activist ...

Black Inventors, Crafting Over 200 Years of Success highlights inventors of color from over seventy countries and five continents. This book took over twenty years to research and documents black inventors from 1769 - 2011. It a must read for parents, students, teachers and librarians. It is most indepth study done on inventors of color to date.

Many Americans are familiar with Thomas Edison's "invention factory" in Menlo Park, where he patented the phonograph, the light bulb and more than one thousand other items. Yet many other ideas have grown in the Garden State, too. New Jerseyans brought sound and music to movies and built the very first drive-in theater. In addition to the first cultivated blueberry, tasty treats like ice cream cones and M&Ms are also Jersey natives. Iconic aspects of American life, like the batting cage, c...