|
William Gray (inventor)
William Gray (1850 – January 24, 1903) was an American inventor and entrepreneur. He is best known for inventing the coin-operated payphone and an improved chest protector for baseball catchers. He founded the highly successful Gray Telephone Pay Station Company, which became one of the largest employers in the Hartford, Connecticut, area. Early life and employment William Gray was born in Tariffville, Connecticut, in December 1850 to Scottish immigrants Neil and Mary Gray. When Gray was young, his family relocated to Boston. His father found a job for him at a local drug store, but the druggist found he preferred tinkering to working, so he was placed in a machine shop. He moved to Hartford and found employment as a polisher in an armory, where he proved to be a good worker. He then worked for Pratt & Whitney, where he rose to head of the polishing department, a position he occupied for 15 years. Inventing Manufacturing Gray tried to improve the manufacturing pro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Payphone
A payphone (alternative spelling: pay phone) is typically a coin-operated public telephone, often located in a telephone booth or in high-traffic outdoor areas, with prepayment by inserting money (usually coins) or by billing a credit or debit card, or a telephone card. Prepaid calling cards also facilitate establishing a call by first calling the provided toll-free telephone number, entering the card account number and PIN, then the desired telephone number. An equipment usage fee may be charged as additional units, minutes or tariff fee to the collect/third-party, debit, credit, telephone or prepaid calling card when used at payphones. By agreement with the landlord, either the phone company pays rent for the location and keeps the revenue, or the landlord pays rent for the phone and shares the revenue. Before the ubiquity of mobile phones, payphones were often found in public places to contribute to the notion of universal access to basic communication services. In the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), with 29 in the United States and 1 in Canada. The NL and AL were formed in 1876 and 1901, respectively. Beginning in 1903, the two leagues signed the National Agreement and cooperated but remained legally separate entities until 2000, when they merged into a single organization led by the Commissioner of Baseball. MLB is headquartered in Midtown Manhattan. It is also included as one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada. Baseball's first all-professional team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings, was founded in 1869. Before that, some teams had secretly paid certain players. The first few decades of professional baseball were characterized by rivalries between leagues and by players who often jumped from one t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Businesspeople From Hartford, Connecticut
A businessperson, businessman, or businesswoman is an individual who has founded, owns, or holds shares in (including as an angel investor) a private-sector company. A businessperson undertakes activities (commercial or industrial) for the purpose of generating cash flow, sales, and revenue by using a combination of human, financial, intellectual, and physical capital with a view to fueling economic development and growth. History Prehistoric period: Traders Since a "businessman" can mean anyone in industry or commerce, businesspeople have existed as long as industry and commerce have existed. "Commerce" can simply mean "trade", and trade has existed through all of recorded history. The first businesspeople in human history were traders or merchants. Medieval period: Rise of the merchant class Merchants emerged as a "class" in medieval Italy (compare, for example, the Vaishya, the traditional merchant caste in Indian society). Between 1300 and 1500, modern accounting ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Inventors From Connecticut
An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an idea is unique enough either as a stand alone invention or as a significant improvement over the work of others, it can be patented. A patent, if granted, gives the inventor a proprietary interest in the patent over a specific period of time, which can be licensed for financial gain. An inventor creates or discovers an invention. The word ''inventor'' comes from the Latin verb ''invenire'', ''invent-'', to find. Although inventing is closely associated with science and engineering, inventors are not necessarily engineers or scientists. Due to advances in artificial intelligence, the term "inventor" no longer exclusively applies to an occupation (see human computers). Some inventions can be patented. The system of patents was established ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
American Businesspeople
American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, people who self-identify their ancestry as "American" ** American English, the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States ** Native Americans in the United States, indigenous peoples of the United States * American, something of, from, or related to the Americas, also known as "America" ** Indigenous peoples of the Americas * American (word), for analysis and history of the meanings in various contexts Organizations * American Airlines, U.S.-based airline headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas * American Athletic Conference, an American college athletic conference * American Recordings (record label), a record label previously known as Def American * American University, in Washington, D.C. Sports teams Soccer ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
American Inventors
American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, people who self-identify their ancestry as "American" ** American English, the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States ** Native Americans in the United States, indigenous peoples of the United States * American, something of, from, or related to the Americas, also known as "America" ** Indigenous peoples of the Americas * American (word), for analysis and history of the meanings in various contexts Organizations * American Airlines, U.S.-based airline headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas * American Athletic Conference, an American college athletic conference * American Recordings (record label), a record label previously known as Def American * American University, in Washington, D.C. Sports teams Soccer ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Great Depression
The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The Financial contagion, economic contagion began around September and led to the Wall Street Crash of 1929, Wall Street stock market crash of October 24 (Black Thursday). It was the longest, deepest, and most widespread depression of the 20th century. Between 1929 and 1932, worldwide Gross domestic product, gross domestic product (GDP) fell by an estimated 15%. By comparison, worldwide GDP fell by less than 1% from 2008 to 2009 during the Great Recession. Some economies started to recover by the mid-1930s. However, in many countries, the negative effects of the Great Depression lasted until the beginning of World War II. Devastating effects were seen in both rich and poor countries with falling personal income, prices, tax revenues, and profits. International t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Smithsonian (magazine)
''Smithsonian'' is the official journal published by the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. The first issue was published in 1970. History The history of ''Smithsonian'' began when Edward K. Thompson, the retired editor of ''Life'' magazine, was asked by the then-Secretary of the Smithsonian, S. Dillon Ripley, to produce a magazine "about things in which the Smithsonian nstitutionis interested, might be interested or ought to be interested." Thompson would later recall that his philosophy for the new magazine was that it "would stir curiosity in already receptive minds. It would deal with history as it is relevant to the present. It would present art, since true art is never dated, in the richest possible reproduction. It would peer into the future via coverage of social progress and of science and technology. Technical matters would be digested and made intelligible by skilled writers who would stimulate readers to reach upward while not turning them off with jargon. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charlie Bennett
Charles Wesley Bennett (November 21, 1854 – February 24, 1927) was an American professional baseball player from 1875 or 1876 through the 1893 season. He played 15 years in Major League Baseball, principally as a catcher, with the Milwaukee Grays (49 games, 1878), Worcester Ruby Legs (51 games, 1880), Detroit Wolverines (625 games, 1881–1888) and Boston Beaneaters (337 games, 1889–1893). He played on four pennant-winning teams, one in Detroit and three in Boston, and is one of only two players (the other being Ned Hanlon) to play with the Detroit Wolverines during all eight seasons of the club's existence. Bennett compiled a .256 batting average and a .340 on-base percentage during his major league career with 549 runs scored, 203 doubles, 67 triples, 55 home runs and 533 runs batted in (RBIs). His greatest value, however, was as one of the greatest defensive players of his era. Between 1880 and 1891, he ranked among the National League leaders 10 times in Defensive ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding team, called the pitcher, throws a ball that a player on the batting team, called the batter, tries to hit with a bat. The objective of the offensive team (batting team) is to hit the ball into the field of play, away from the other team's players, allowing its players to run the bases, having them advance counter-clockwise around four bases to score what are called " runs". The objective of the defensive team (referred to as the fielding team) is to prevent batters from becoming runners, and to prevent runners' advance around the bases. A run is scored when a runner legally advances around the bases in order and touches home plate (the place where the player started as a batter). The principal objective of the batting team is to hav ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Deacon White
James Laurie "Deacon" White (December 2, 1847 – July 7, 1939) was an American baseball player who was one of the principal stars during the first two decades of the sport's professional era. The outstanding catcher of the 1870s during baseball's barehanded period, he caught more games than any other player during the decade, and was a major figure on five consecutive championship teams from 1873 to 1877 – three in the National Association (NA), in which he played throughout its five-year existence from 1871 to 1875, and two in the National League (NL), which was formed as the first fully recognized major league in , partially as a result of White and three other stars moving from the powerhouse Boston Red Stockings to the Chicago White Stockings. Although he was already 28 when the NL was established, White played 15 seasons in the major leagues, completing a 23-year career at the top levels of the sport. In 1871, White was the first batter to come to the plate in the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Spalding (company)
Spalding is an American sports equipment manufacturing company founded by Albert Spalding in Chicago, in 1876, although it is now headquartered in Bowling Green, Kentucky. Spalding currently primarily focuses on basketball, mainly producing balls but also commercializing hoops, rims, nets and ball pump needles. Softballs are commercialized through its subsidiary Dudley Sports. In the past, Spalding has manufactured balls for other sports, such as American football, baseball, soccer, volleyball, tennis and golf. For a brief period in the 1980s, Spalding was also a designer of aftermarket automotive wheels. History The company was founded in 1876 when Albert Spalding was a pitcher and manager of a baseball team in Chicago, the Chicago White Stockings. The company standardized early baseballs and developed the modern baseball bat with the bulge at its apex. In 1892, Spalding acquired Wright & Ditson and A. J. Reach, both rival sporting goods companies. In 1893, A.G. S ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
