Vincent Waterson

Inventive Minds of 20th Century America Vincent Waterson

Since 1790 over six million patents have been issued in the USA. Of these, approximately 5.8 million were awarded in the 20th century. The inventions they covered have been credited with providing the USA with its industrial supremacy. Whereas the patents awarded to a handful of famous 20th century inventors such as Edison, Marconi and Tesla are well known, there are hundreds of thousands of other inventors who contributed to the greatness of the USA whose names are long forgotten, consigned to files in the USA Patent Office, only to be reviewed by patent lawyers and Patent Office examiners and which rarely, if ever, see the light of day. Decades Publishing is shining a light on these inventors and inventions through a series of books. The first book will trace inventors of new models of bicycles, improvements to bicycles and bicycle attachments. These books are not chronicling the history of bicycle designs, but rather they are celebrating the inventors themselves, whose intellect and perseverance enabled them to obtain patents for their inventions. In the early part of the 20th century patent drawings were works of art with fine detail, usually expertly drawn by a patent draftsman based on the inventor's rough sketches or from viewing the invention itself. In those days the draftsmen produced beautiful line-art drawings that show in stunning detail the inner workings of everything from bicycles to motor vehicles. The Patent Office used photo lithography to make copies of the original drawings. While the inventors' names are recorded for posterity at the Patent Office, sadly the names of the skilled illustrators who created these works of art were not included in the patent applications, and most of their names may never be known; a loss to the world of art.