science book
A science book is a work of nonfiction, usually written by a scientist, researcher, or professor like Stephen Hawking (''A Brief History of Time''), or sometimes by a non-scientist such as Bill Bryson ('' A Short History of Nearly Everything''). ...
for children by
L. Sprague de Camp
Lyon Sprague de Camp (; November 27, 1907 – November 6, 2000) was an American writer of science fiction, fantasy and non-fiction. In a career spanning 60 years, he wrote over 100 books, including novels and works of non-fiction, including biog ...
, published by Doubleday in 1961. It was reprinted in 1993 by
Barnes & Noble
Barnes & Noble Booksellers is an American bookseller. It is a Fortune 1000 company and the bookseller with the largest number of retail outlets in the United States. As of July 7, 2020, the company operates 614 retail stores across all 50 U. ...
under the alternate title ''The Heroes of American Invention''.OCLC record for second edition. /ref> The book has been translated in Portuguese.
Summary
By "heroic age" the author means the era of
American history
The history of the lands that became the United States began with the arrival of the first people in the Americas around 15,000 BC. Numerous indigenous cultures formed, and many saw transformations in the 16th century away from more densely ...
in which individual initiative and enterprise constituted the primary thread in technical innovation, roughly from the early 19th century until
mass production
Mass production, also known as flow production or continuous production, is the production of substantial amounts of standardized products in a constant flow, including and especially on assembly lines. Together with job production and batch ...
and corporate enterprise outpaced that of the individual around the time of
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
. The story of innovation is told through the biographies and inventions of thirty-two key
inventor
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 ...
s of the United States'
industrial revolution
The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...
, whom de Camp feels were pivotal in converting the country from an agrarian nation to an industrial one.
Some of the inventors spotlighted include
Robert L. Stevens
Colonel Robert Livingston Stevens (October 18, 1787 – April 20, 1856) was an American inventor and steamship builder who served as president of the Camden and Amboy Railroad in the 1830s and 1840s.
Early life
Stevens was born in Hoboken, Ne ...
,
George Westinghouse
George Westinghouse Jr. (October 6, 1846 – March 12, 1914) was an American entrepreneur and engineer based in Pennsylvania who created the railway air brake and was a pioneer of the electrical industry, receiving his first patent at the age of ...
,
Joseph Henry
Joseph Henry (December 17, 1797– May 13, 1878) was an American scientist who served as the first Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. He was the secretary for the National Institute for the Promotion of Science, a precursor of the Smith ...
Samuel Colt
Samuel Colt (; July 19, 1814 – January 10, 1862) was an American inventor, industrialist, and businessman who established Colt's Patent Fire-Arms Manufacturing Company (now Colt's Manufacturing Company) and made the mass production of r ...
Hudson Maxim
Hudson Maxim (February 3, 1853 – May 6, 1927), was a U.S. inventor and chemist who invented a variety of explosives, including smokeless gunpowder, Thomas Edison referred to him as "the most versatile man in America". He was the brother of ...
John Ericsson
John Ericsson (born Johan Ericsson; July 31, 1803 – March 8, 1889) was a Swedish-American inventor. He was active in England and the United States.
Ericsson collaborated on the design of the railroad steam locomotive ''Novelty'', which com ...
Ottmar Mergenthaler
Ottmar Mergenthaler (11 May 1854 – 28 October 1899) was a German-American inventor who has been called a second Gutenberg, as Mergenthaler invented the linotype machine, the first device that could easily and quickly set complete lines ...
Alexander Graham Bell
Alexander Graham Bell (, born Alexander Bell; March 3, 1847 – August 2, 1922) was a Scottish-born inventor, scientist and engineer who is credited with patenting the first practical telephone. He also co-founded the American Telephone and Te ...
,
Thomas Edison
Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847October 18, 1931) was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices in fields such as electric power generation, mass communication, sound recording, and motion pictures. These inventio ...
George Baldwin Selden
George Baldwin Selden (September 14, 1846 – January 17, 1922) was a patent lawyer and inventor who was granted a U.S. patent for an automobile in 1895.Flink, p. 51 ''Probably the most absurd action in the history of patent law was the granting ...
,
Samuel Pierpoint Langley
Samuel Pierpont Langley (August 22, 1834 – February 27, 1906) was an American aviation pioneer, astronomer and physicist who invented the bolometer. He was the third secretary of the Smithsonian Institution and a professor of astronomy a ...
Reginald Aubrey Fessenden
Reginald Aubrey Fessenden (October 6, 1866 – July 22, 1932) was a Canadian-born inventor, who did a majority of his work in the United States and also claimed U.S. citizenship through his American-born father. During his life he received hundre ...
,
Lee de Forest
Lee de Forest (August 26, 1873 – June 30, 1961) was an American inventor and a fundamentally important early pioneer in electronics. He invented the first electronic device for controlling current flow; the three-element "Audion" triode va ...
, and
Edwin Howard Armstrong
Edwin Howard Armstrong (December 18, 1890 – February 1, 1954) was an American electrical engineer and inventor, who developed FM (frequency modulation) radio and the superheterodyne receiver system. He held 42 patents and received numerous aw ...
.
Contents
*I. Invention Comes to America
*II. The Heroic Age Begins
*III. The Stevenses and Railroading
*IV. Henry, Morse, and the Telegraph
*V. Colt and Other Gunmakers
*VI. McCormick and Farm Machinery
*VII. Ericsson and the Modern Warship
*VIII. Kelly and Steel Refining
*IX. Mergenthaler, Sholes, and Writing Machines
*X. Bell and the Telephone
*XI. Edison and the Electric Light
*XII. Thomson and Alternating-Current Power
*XIII. Selden and the Automobile
*XIV. Langley, The Wrights, and Flying
*XV. Fessenden, De Forest, and Radio
*XVI. The End of the Heroic Age
*Notes
*Bibliography
*Index