On November 11, 1856, U.S. Patent Np. 16082 issued to Henry Bessemer on the Manufacture of Iron and Steel:
Bessemer’s steel-making process was the most important technique for making steel in the nineteenth century. Bessemer system involved blowing air through molten pig iron to remove the impurities, make steel easier, quicker and cheaper to manufacture. Bessemer also made at least 128 other inventions in the fields of iron, steel and glass. He was knighted for his contribution to science in 1879, and in the same year was made a fellow of the Royal Society.
On November 10, 1964, U.S. Patent No. 3,156,177 on Food Preheating, Cooking and Warming Device issued to Harlan Sanders:
A few years later, the Colonel received a second patent, U.S. Patent No. 3,245,800 on a Process of Producing Fried Chicken Under Pressure:
Interestingly, in the Process of Producing Fried Chicken Under Pressure it is the chicken that is under pressure, not the poor cook behind the counter.
On November 8, 1910, U.S. Patent No. 974785 on an Electric Insect Destroyer issued to William M. Frost:
However electric bug zappers go back even further. 20 years earlier, on April 1, 1890, Francois Scherer received U.S. Patent No. 424729 on an Electric Trap:
On November 2, 2004, U.S. Patent No. 6,812,392 issued to Marlon Brando — yes, THAT Marlon Brando — on a Drumhead Tensioning Device and Method:
This was actually the fourth patent Brando received on this improvement in tuning conga drums, following U.S. Patent Nos. 6,410,833, 6,441,286, and 6,667,432. While his invention made it easier to tune conga drums, it would make the drums more expensive, and unfortunately it didn’t have a chance to catch on before his death in 2004.
On November 1, 1988, Claude G. Coots received U.S. Patent No. 4,780,985 on an Electric Mouse Exterminator
The metaphor “Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door” originated in a different form with Ralph Waldo Emerson, who in 1855 wrote:
If a man has good corn or wood, or boards, or pigs, to sell, or can make better chairs or knives, crucibles or church organs, than anybody else, you will find a broad hard-beaten road to his house, though it be in the woods.
In 1882, a month after his death, the following quotation was attributed to Emerson by The Cincinnati Enquirer:
If a man can write a better book, preach a better sermon or make a better mouse-trap than his neighbors, though he builds his house in the woods, the world will make a beaten path to his door. If a man has good corn or wood, or boards, or pigs, to sell, or can make better chairs or knives, crucibles or church organs, than anybody else, you will find a broad hard-beaten road to his house, though it be in the woods.
Whoever edited Emerson to add “mouse trap” knew what he was doing — the USPTO has issued more that 4400 patents, on mouse traps, the most recent being U.S. Patent No. 12,446,567, on a Rodent Disposal Device, which electrocutes the rodent and projects the rodent out with a spring:
