BloggingGermanClass: 19th Century Inventions and Industry

Inventions:

Bicycle

The earliest bicycle was a wooden scooter-like contraption called a celerifere; invented around 1790 by Comte Mede de Sivrac of France. In 1816, Baron Karl von Drais de Sauerbrun, of Germany, invented a model with a steering bar attached to the front wheel, which he called a Draisienne or laufmaschine (running machine) weighing around 48 pounds. The bike had two wheels of the same size with a seat in between them and a bar to steer the front wheel. The rider would sit on the seat and propel themselves forward with their legs. Karl von Drais de Sauerbrun exhibited his bicycle in Paris on April 6, 1818.

Blue Jeans

Levi Strauss (1829-1902) was an entrepreneur who invented and marketed blue jeans. He trained as a tailor in Buttenheim, Bavaria, Germany. Strauss moved to the United States and sold dry goods to the 49ers (people who came to California during the gold rush which started in 1849). In 1873, Strauss and Jacob Davis (a Nevada tailor) patented the idea, which was thought up by Davis, of using copper rivets at the stress points of sturdy work pants. Early on, Levis (then known as “waist overalls”) were made from brown canvas duck fabric and heavy blue denim fabric. The duck fabric pants were not very successful, so were dropped early on. Levi Strauss business was a hit and became very successful and continues to be a popular brand of pants today.

Bunsen Burner

The laboratory Bunsen burner was invented by Robert Wilhelm Bunsen in 1855. Bunsen (1811-1899) was a German chemist and teacher. He invented the Bunsen burner for his research in isolating chemical substances - it has a high-intensity, non-luminous flame that does not interfere with the colored flame emitted by chemicals being tested.

Contact Lenses

The idea of contact lenses was envisioned by Leonardo da Vinci around 1508 and later thought of by Rene Descartes in the sixteen hundreds but was invented until 1887 by German physiologist Adolf Eugen Fick (1829-1901). Fick first made the lenses for animals and eventually made them for people. Fick's lenses were made from heavy brown glass and were 18-21 mm in diameter. Later the lenses were improved in 1889 by August Muller to help people with nearsightedness.

Kindergarten

Friedrich Wilhelm August Froebel (1782-1852) was a German educator and educational reformer who invented the kindergarten meaning "garden of children". He opened the first kindergarten in Bad Blankenburg in 1837. Froebel also founded a kindergarten training school at Liebenstein, Germany in 1849. After some conflicts and mistaken charges of treason, the German government banned the establishment of kindergartens in 1851 but in 1860 the government repealed the ban, and kindergartens re-opened. Unfortunately Froebel had already passed away. Froebel's kindergartens included pleasant surroundings, self-motivated activity, play, music, and the physical training of the child.

Motorcycle

The earliest motorcycle was a coal-powered, two-cylinder, steam-driven motorcycle that was developed in 1867 by the American inventor Sylvester Howard Roper. A gas-powered motorcycle was invented by the German inventor Gottlieb Daimler in 1885 who collaborated with Wilhelm Maybach. His mainly wooden motorcycle had iron-banded wheels with wooden spokes and was powered by a single-cylinder engine. To start it a person would have to crank the crank handle. The motorcycle was powered by benzine (petrol).

X-rays

X-rays were discovered in 1895 by Wilhelm Konrad von Roentgen (1845-1923). Roentgen was a German physicist who described this new form of radiation that allowed him to photograph objects that were hidden behind opaque shields. He even photographed part of his own skeleton. X-rays were soon used as an important diagnostic tool in medicine. Roentgen called these waves "X-radiation" because so little was known about them.

Aspirin

Felix Hoffman created aspirin and was sold by the Bayer company on August 10^th, 1897. Hoffman discovered a synthesized white powder also known as acetylsalicylic acid. The white powder was capable of relieving pain, causing nausea, and can corrode the mucous membranes. After testing within the company, the sales figures were sensational and became best-selling on the market. About 12,000 of the 50,000 tons of acetylsalicyclic acid produced annually still come from Bayer.

Automobile

In 1885, German mechanical engineer, Karl Benz designed and built the world's first practical automobile to be powered by an internal-combustion engine. On January 29, 1886, Benz received the first patent for a gas-fueled car. It was a three-wheeler. Benz built his first four-wheeled car in 1891. Benz & Company, the company started by the inventor, became the world's largest manufacturer of automobiles by 1900.

Bacteriology

When herds of livestock were stricken by a dangerous disease throughout Europe in 1870, Robert Koch, a country doctor from Posen (Posen owned by Germany in the 1870's and later during WWII, but is now part of Poland), decided to search for the cause.

He saved a large proportion of his money to buy a microscope and examined the animal substances for possible pathogens. He soon made a find. Bacteria were the cause of the disease. With this discovery, Koch founded a new branch of science: bacteriology. Whether epidemics or gangrene: the new findings were a call to battle against many infectious diseases and advanced hygiene as the foundation of human health. The discovery of the tuberculosis bacillus in 1882 brought international fame to Robert Koch and drove the scientist to further studies.

Glider

The research of Otto Lilienthal, an inventor born in Anklam, Mecklenburg, showed that birds flight is due to the curvature of the wing and not a defeat of gravity which was earlier presumed. Thanks to his skilled craftsmanship, he became in 1894 the first flyer in the history of mankind with his glider. As a leading expert in the area of flight technology, Lilienthal wrote articles and corresponded with other flight pioneers around the world. In 1896, he died tragically during a test flight. His findings led the Wright brothers in the USA to the discovery of the motorized airplane.

Record Player (Gramophone)

With the invention of the record player in 1887, Emile Berliner brought music into the living room for more than 100 years. He changed the angle between the needle and carrier foil by 90 degrees.

Telephone

The telephone was invented by at least five different people in four different countries. Although the Scottish-American Alexander Graham Bell is generally credited as the "winner" in the race to invent the telephone in the period between 1850 and 1876, his invention was paralleled by the German Philipp Reis, the Belgian-French M. Charles Bourseul, the Italian Antonio Meucci, and the American Elisha Gray.

Reis had started to develop the telephone by putting together a violin, a knitting needle, a large cork, a coil of wire, and a sausage. This was the beginnings of his building process and after nine years of working towards a telephone Reis had refined his device to the point that he could present it to Frankfurt's Physics Association (known as Der Physikalische Verein) in 1861. A few were made but Reis's machine wasn't practical enough to become commercial by only being able to transmit unclear sound. Reis died and two years later Bell's patent was created in 1876.

Four-stroke internal combustion engine (Viertakt-Verbrennungsmotor)

Nikolaus August Otto (1832-1891) was born in Holzhausen, Germany. In 1876, together with Eugen Langen (1833-1895), he pioneered the four-stroke internal combustion engine. However, Otto's patent was invalidated in 1886 when it was discovered that another inventor, the Frenchman Alphonse Beau de Rochas (1815-1845), had described the four-stroke cycle principle in an earlier published paper.

Diesel Engine (der Dieselmotor )

After many years of work, in 1897 Rudolf succeeded in running a diesel engine . In 1898 Rudolf then wrote a patent for the “internal combustion engine”. Rudolf proved that a theoretical 75.6% efficiency was possible, whereas the popular at the time steam engine only was able to achieve 10-12%. Through licensing the patent he was soon able to become a millionaire.

Industry

Clip. The Industrial Revolution was a period from the 18th to the 19th century where major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation, and technology had a profound effect on the social, economic and cultural conditions of the times. It began in Britain, then subsequently spread throughout Western Europe, North America, Japan, and eventually the world.

The Industrial Revolution marks a major turning point in human history; almost every aspect of daily life was influenced in some way. Most notably, average income and population began to exhibit unprecedented sustained growth. In the two centuries following 1800, the world's average per capita income increased over tenfold, while the world's population increased over sixfold.

The introduction of steam power fueled primarily by coal, wider utilisation of water wheels and powered machinery (mainly in textile manufacturing) underpinned the dramatic increases in production capacity. The development of all-metal machine tools in the first two decades of the 19th century facilitated the manufacture of more production machines for manufacturing in other industries.

The First Industrial Revolution, which began in the 18th century, merged into the Second Industrial Revolution around 1850, when technological and economic progress gained momentum with the development of steam-powered ships, railways, and later in the 19th century with the internal combustion engine and electrical power generation.

In terms of social structure, the Industrial Revolution witnessed the triumph of a middle class of industrialists and businessmen over a landed class of nobility and gentry. Ordinary working people found increased opportunities for employment in the new mills and factories, but these were often under strict working conditions with long hours of labour dominated by a pace set by machines. As late as the year 1900, most industrial workers in the United States still worked a 10-hour day (12 hours in the steel industry), yet earned from 20 to 40 percent less than the minimum deemed necessary for a decent life. However, harsh working conditions were prevalent long before the Industrial Revolution took place. Pre-industrial society was very static and often cruel—child labor, dirty living conditions, and long working hours were just as prevalent before the Industrial Revolution.

Based on its leadership in chemical research in the universities and industrial laboratories, Germany became dominant in the world's chemical industry in the late 19th century. At first the production of dyes based on aniline was critical. Germany

Germany's political disunity—with three dozen states—and a pervasive conservatism made it difficult to build railways in the 1830s. However, by the 1840s, trunk lines linked the major cities; each German state was responsible for the lines within its own borders. Lacking a technological base at first, the Germans imported their engineering and hardware from Britain, but quickly learned the skills needed to operate and expand the railways. In many cities, the new railway shops were the centres of technological awareness and training, so that by 1850, Germany was self-sufficient in meeting the demands of railroad construction, and the railways were a major impetus for the growth of the new steel industry. Observers found that even as late as 1890, their engineering was inferior to Britain’s. However, German unification in 1870 stimulated consolidation, nationalisation into state-owned companies, and further rapid growth. Unlike the situation in France, the goal was support of industrialisation, and so heavy lines crisscrossed the Ruhr and other industrial districts, and provided good connections to the major ports of Hamburg and Bremen. By 1880, Germany had 9,400 locomotives pulling 43,000 passengers and 30,000 tons of freight, and pulled ahead of France. End Clip. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_Revolution#Germany> December 7^th, 2011.

Websites

<en.wikipedia.org> December 7th, 2011

<kiboomu.com> December 7th, 2011

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Province_of_Posen

totango.net> December 7th, 2011

<http://users.humboldt.edu/nkidwell/project_kidwell.html> December 7th, 2011

<http://musicbicycles.blogspot.com/2010/02/who-invented-bicycle.html> December 7th, 2011

<http://www.enchantedlearning.com/inventors/germany.shtml> December 7th, 2011

<http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2009/02/dayintech_0217> December 7th, 2011

<http://www.falconmotorcycles.com/blog/falcon-blog/66-people/194-the-pioneer-gottlieb-daimler.html> December 7th, 2011

<http://www.accessexcellence.org/AE/AEC/CC/historical_background.php> December 7th, 2011

<http://germanoriginality.com/madein/inventions.php?id=45> December 7th, 2011