Notes

One of the reasons the U.S. became a great industrial nation was the inventive spirit of the American people. In the late 1800's, hundreds of useful inventions led to the development of new products and industries. More factories were built. Workers were hired to keep up with the rising demand for consumer goods and manufactured products.


Read on and you can learn:
• How the telephone was invented and the accident that proved it works.
• How Edison’s “invention factory” gave Americans fascinating devices and Edison the nickname “wizard!”
• Why many Americans kept shouting “Get a horse!”
New developments in communication brought Americans closer together in the late 1800's. Since 1844, the telegraph had improved communication across America. However, it still took weeks for a message to cross the Atlantic by ship. Cyrus Field tried to change all that when, in 1858, he supervised the laying of a cable across the Atlantic floor. The cable worked well, but only for a few messages. Then it snapped. In 1866, on his second try, an improved cable was laid. The transatlantic cable was a success. Messages that had taken weeks now took minutes to pass between the European and North American continents. The benefits of faster and easier communication were enormous.
The telegraph sent messages that were coded into dots and dashes, known as Morse code. Although its use was much faster than the mail, using Morse code made it difficult to send long messages.

In the late 1800's, Alexander Graham Bell was a teacher of the deaf. He was also an inventor of hearing devices. In 1876, Bell put the final touches on a new invention called the telephone. By March of 1876, he decided he was ready to test this invention. But, as he began testing, he spilled battery acid on himself! He spoke into the machine. Bell called to his assistant Thomas Watson, who was in the next room: "Watson, come here, I want you!" Mr. Watson rushed into the room. He had heard everything Bell had said, through the telephone. Bell’s telephone worked!
Generally considered the greatest inventor of all time, Thomas Edison was famous world-wide. He patented more than 1,000 inventions! Edison always said that the key to his success was hard work. He explained, “Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.”The late 1800's was a boom time for inventors. As a result of their work, the economic power of the United States grew very quickly.
• The invention that changed what America had for dinner: Americans began to see more meat on their dinner tables because of the work of Gustavus Swift. Swift, a meat packer, invented refrigerated railroad cars. His company shipped cattle from western ranches to Chicago by train. Using refrigeration, Swift was able to send fresh meat from Chicago to other parts of the U.S.
• The “Real McCoy”: Elijah McCoy was the son of escaped slaves. In 1872, McCoy invented a lubrication device which allowed machines to be oiled while still running. Before the invention, machines had to be turned off to be oiled several times a day. His product was so successful that people wanted to make certain they were getting the model that McCoy made. So they asked for the “real McCoy.” Have you heard this saying? It means the “real thing,” not something fake or second-rate.• A better typewriter: Christopher Sholes didn’t invent the typewriter. Many inventors before him had worked on the idea. But Sholes perfected the typewriter, which means that he worked to improve its design. One problem early typewriters had was keys that often jammed when the typist typed too fast. To prevent this problem, Christopher Sholes rearranged the keyboard so that the most commonly used letters were far apart. His keyboard design is still in use today. In 1868, Sholes received a patent for his “Type-Writer”.
• Look into the camera!: The first easy-to-use, lightweight camera was developed by George Eastman in 1888. He made up the word “Kodak” for the camera because he thought it was easy to spell and pronounce. Each camera was priced at $25 and took 100 pictures. Then the entire camera had to be returned to the company with a payment of $10. The film was developed and the camera was reloaded with new film. The camera was then returned to the customer. By 1891, Eastman had invented film that the consumer could load at home.There was an exciting breakthrough in transportation in the late 1890's. This invention changed the nation and the world. What was it? The automobile. This invention was as much a major change in transportation as railroads had been fifty years earlier. At first, some people thought automobiles would not really work! Today, it is hard to imagine life without a car.

No single person invented the automobile. But it was Henry Ford who created a revolution in automaking. Ford began by working on machines in Detroit, Michigan. He constructed his first gasoline motor in 1893. He built his first car a few years later. In 1903, Henry Ford established the Ford Motor Company. Ford’s goal was to produce an affordable car. His creation, which came out in 1908, became known as the Model T. This car was sturdy and inexpensive (at $850). Many people could to afford to buy it. (By 1916, the price of the Model T had dropped to $360.) Ford announced that the customer “can have any color that he likes as long as it is black.”When Henry Ford made automobiles available to the average family, this changed American society forever. The federal and state governments had to build more and better roads. People had to go to hardware stores to buy cans of gasoline to run their Model T’s. So, the gas station was born. With better roads, people traveled more, and restaurants and motels were built along highway routes.

Some people were afraid of automobiles. Medical doctors warned that the dangers of traveling at such fast speeds could harm the human body. (Several areas in the U.S. required goggles for all drivers, for eye safety.) Some cities banned automobiles, or set a speed limit of three miles an hour.

At first, there were no auto driving rules and no driver’s licenses. Accidents were very common. Sometimes, a horseback rider would pass a Model T in the ditch or broken down on the side of the road. Making fun of the car’s problems, riders sometimes yelled, “Get a horse!”Toward the end of the 1800's, an explosion of new ideas brought important changes to America. In this learning activity, you will review the story of three men whose inventions changed the world. These men helped transform the United States into an industrial nation: Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Edison, and Henry Ford.
Read on to learn:
• How the telephone was invented
• What the “Wizard of Menlo Park” invented
• How Henry Ford created a new way to make carsIn the 1870's, Alexander Graham Bell was working at a school for the deaf in Boston. He became interested in the idea that sound could be sent from one point to another over a wire. He wanted to experiment with his ideas, but first he had to learn more about electricity. Bell teamed up with a partner who ran an electrical shop, Thomas A. Watson.

After teaching all day, Alexander Bell would go to Thomas Watson’s shop to experiment with his sound machine. Bell and Watson worked on the device for three years, until their invention suddenly went “twang!” The two men then worked excitedly until they got the device to transmit the sound of Bell’s voice. But it was all mushy and garbled. After three more days, a famous incident happened. Bell accidentally spilled battery acid on himself and called “Mr. Watson, come here. I want you!” Watson rushed down the hall, saying “Mr. Bell, I heard you!” The telephone worked! Alexander Graham Bell’s telephone was patented in 1876. The telephone caused a revolution in communication worldwide. In the United States, by 1900 there were more than 1.3 million telephones in operation.

In 1876, Thomas Edison set up a laboratory at Menlo Park, New Jersey. This research laboratory became his “inventions factory.” Edison and other scientists spent a lot of time there, creating new inventions. The laboratory produced amazing devices! Edison earned the nickname “Wizard of Menlo Park” for inventing the light bulb, phonograph, mimeograph machine, storage battery, and hundreds of other new products.

Thomas Edison was also the first person to develop an electrical system for a city. It included generators that produced electricity, and wires and fuses that carried electricity. He used light bulbs as a part of the system. Edison also supervised the building of the system, which was built in a section of New York City in 1882. After that, factories replaced steam power with electricity. The modern electrical age had begun.
In 1881, Alexander Graham Bell formed the Bell Telephone Company. Businesses were the first to install telephones. Eventually, telephones made their way into people’s homes. No longer did people have to travel to telegraph offices. They could now talk on the telephone!