Canned Food
In 1795, the French government, concerned about the limiting
availability of large quantities of food during military campaigns, offered a
cash award to inventors for an efficiently cheap method of food preservation.
Over the next 15 years, Nicolas Appert, a Parisian confectioner, experimented
with various techniques using glass bottles; in 1810, he was awarded the prize
for a process similar to pasteurization known as “appertisation,” in which the
bottles were tightly sealed with a vise and placed in boiling water to cook the
contents. As Appert's model became more widespread, Peter Durand, a British
merchant and inventor, patented an improved process utilizing tin canisters
later that same year. In 1812, Durand sold the patent to British industrialists
John Hall and Bryan Donkin, who began producing canned food for the British
army; six years later, Durand re-patented his invention in the United States.
By 1822, canned food became a recognizable domestic staple in Britain, France
and the U.S., and a fundamental necessity in conflicts from the (original) Crimean
War to the Second World War.
Microwave Oven
Working for the Raytheon Corporation after World War II, Dr.
Percy Spencer accidentally discovered the practical application of microwave
radiation as a by-product from his research on radar technology. Noting that a
candy bar in his pocket melted when exposed to the radiation, he was spurred to
conduct further experiments on a way to rapidly cook food. Called the
“Radarange,” Tappan, under a patent-license with Raytheon, began manufacturing units
designed for home use starting in 1955. However, it would take another twelve years
to develop a commercially viable countertop oven, introduced by the Amana
Corporation, a Raytheon subsidiary, in 1967.
Nylon
Created by DuPont's Wallace Carothers, nylon was an
anticipatory invention during the 1930s intended as a synthetic replacement for
scarce Asian silk due to the impending Second World War. It was introduced
commercially in a nylon-bristled toothbrush in 1938, followed more notably two
years later as women’s stockings. During the war, it was used extensively in
the production of parachutes, as well as other military equipment like tires
and protective gear. From rope to dress shirts, nylon's application in modern
society is now an inescapable reality.
Cargo Pants
A modern fashion trend, cargo pants (and the variation of
shorts) were originally created for military use in the late 1930s. Designed
for use by British military personnel, particularly paratroopers, the
large-pocketed pants made it easier to carry military equipment like portable
communication devices and extra ammunition. Unlike nylon stockings, which were
an immediate hit on the fashion scene in the 1940s, it would take another sixty
years for cargo pants to go from functional to fashionable.
WD-40
In 1953, Norm Larsen, founder of the Rocket Chemical
Company, invented this handy lubricant as a water displacement ("WD")
and corrosion inhibitor for the Atlas Intercontinental Ballistic Missile. Allegedly,
it was his 40th attempt to perfect the formula, which is a trade
secret; to avoid full disclosure of its ingredients, it has never been
patented. Based in San Diego, California, Larsen’s invention became
commercially available in the city’s hardware stores five years later.
Duct Tape
In 1942, the U.S. military needed a quick and easy way to
seal ammunition cases to prevent water from getting in. Fifteen years earlier,
the Revolite Corporation, a division of Johnson & Johnson, had developed
medical tape made from a rubber-based adhesive and “duck” cloth. Headed by John
Denoye and Bill Gross, a new tape was adapted from the design for the military
per their requirements, including the ability that it be ripped by hand rather
than by the standard use of scissors. Originally, the adhesive was gray; the
tape itself, made of a waterproof flexible plastic, was colored olive drab. Known
by soldiers as “duck tape,” it was quickly put to use repairing everything from
weapons to vehicles. In 1950, Cleveland-based Melvin A. Anderson Company
acquired the rights to the tape; re-colored gray to match silver ductwork, it rapidly
became a common application for sealing air ducts.
Wireless Communication
Perhaps considered a marvel of modern technology, wireless
communication, like the microwave oven, has a unique development history.
During World War II, Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler, otherwise known as actress Hedy
Lamarr – an intellect beyond her beauty and tinkerer in her spare time away
from the Hollywood spotlight – and her neighbor, composer George Antheil,
co-invented and patented a frequency-hopping radio guidance system for use in
torpedoes. The system was designed to make it difficult for enemies to jam or
detect them. Although rejected by the United States Navy at the time, the
system was the precursor to and basis for a number of today’s communication
systems including Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.
Global Positioning System (GPS)
At the height of the Cold War between the United States and
the Soviet Union (you know…that long-ago era that President Obama mocked Mitt
Romney about wanting their foreign policy back?), the U.S. Navy needed a means
to determine the exact location of its submarine-launched ballistic missiles
(SLBMs). Likewise, the U.S. Air Force needed an improved navigation system for
its arsenal of strategic bombers and Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles
(ICBMs). Deeming such a system vital to national security as part of the
nuclear deterrence strategy, Congress immediately funded its development.
Combining the research efforts of the Navy, Air Force and U.S. Army – which had
been working on its own system for surveying purposes – the Navstar-GPS system (initially called the
Defense Navigation Satellite System)
was deployed for military use in the 1970s. In 1983, U.S. President Ronald
Reagan issued a directive granting civilian use of GPS after the Soviet Union
shot down a commercial airline, Korean Air Lines Flight 007, alleged to have
violated Russian airspace; six years later, the first-ever civilian satellite
was launched into space.
Internet
Throughout the 1960s, several methods were researched in the
United Kingdom and the United States for “digital networking communication”
(packet switching) for use by the military. On October 29, 1969, the U.S.
Department of Defense’s Advanced Research Projects Agency (A.R.P.A..; later D.A.R.P.A.)
initiated ARPANET, designed as a network connection between various projects
among its research centers and laboratories. Though initially crashing, the
four-node network – consisting of both the University of California at Los Angeles
and at Santa Barbara, the Stanford Research Institute and the University of Utah
– was permanently linked by December 5. From there, the network expanded
exponentially throughout the 1970s and 1980s as more university and government
nodes were connected to it. With the further advance of protocols and
technologies, the turning point came with passage of the High Performance Computing Act of 1991 (HPCA). Crafted and
sponsored by then-U.S. Senator Al Gore, Jr., HPCA helped fund the University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s research and development of Mosaic – the browser
considered to have launched the World Wide Web. (So yeah, Al Gore kind of did help
invent the Internet.)
Freelancer
In medieval times, a knight for hire who had no master and
whose weapon of choice, the lance,
was available for a fee. After publication of Sir Walter Scott’s novel, Ivanhoe, in 1820, the term used to
describe these mercenary “free lances” came into mainstream usage to describe
any self-employed person not beholden to a particular employer.
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