1985: The first official reference guide for the C++ programming language is published. The author, Bjarne Stroustrup, is also the language’s creator.
Stroustrup had been hacking away at his replacement for the C programming language at AT&T Bell labs since 1979, where he and his colleagues in the research department were given free reign to experiment [...]
Posts Tagged ‘Inventions’
Oct. 14, 1985: C++ Adds to Programming
October 14th, 2010 |
No Comments
Oct. 6, 1927: The Jazz Singer Gives Movie Audiences the ‘Talkies’
October 6th, 2010 |
No Comments
1927: Prohibition-era movie audiences in New York City get drunk with excitement when they hear Broadway belter Al Jolson appear on the big screen and bark, “Wait a minute, wait a minute, you ain’t heard nothin’ yet.”
At the premiere of The Jazz Singer, attendee Doris Warner recalled that when Jolson and co-star Eugenie [...]
Sept. 8, 1930: Scotch Tape Starts Sticking
September 8th, 2010 |
No Comments
1930: 3M begins marketing the first waterproof, transparent, pressure-sensitive tape after employee Richard Drew figures out how to coat strips of cellophane with adhesive.
Initially sold by the St. Paul, Minnesota, company as a moisture-proof seal for bakers, grocers and meatpackers, the product quickly got repurposed during the Depression by money-strapped consumers who used the tape [...]
Sept. 2, 1969: First U.S. ATM Starts Doling Out Dollars
September 2nd, 2010 |
No Comments
1969: Six weeks after landing men on the moon, Americans take another giant leap for mankind with the nation’s first cash-spewing, automated teller machine.
The machine, called the Docuteller, was installed in a wall of the Chemical Bank in Rockville Centre, New York. It marked the first time reusable, magnetically coded cards were used to withdraw [...]
Aug. 19, 1839: Photography Goes Open Source
August 19th, 2010 |
No Comments
1839: With a French pension in hand, Louis Daguerre reveals the secrets of making daguerreotypes to a waiting world. The pioneering photographic process is an instant hit.
Using chemical reactions to make images with light was not quite new. Doing it fast was. Inventor Joseph Nicéphore Niepce created a rough image using silver salts and [...]
Aug. 12, 1888: Road Trip! Berta Takes the Benz
August 12th, 2010 |
No Comments
1888: Berta Benz, wife of inventor Karl Benz, takes her husband’s car on the first documented road trip in an automobile.
The trip would also include the first road repairs, the first automotive marketing stunt, the first case of a wife borrowing her husband’s car without asking, and the first violation of intercity highway laws [...]
Aug. 4, 1922: For Whom the Bell Tolls Not
August 4th, 2010 |
No Comments
1922: All telephone service in the United States and Canada is silenced for one minute to mark the funeral of Alexander Graham Bell. The tribute starts a trend that may deserve a revival in the 21st century.
Bell was one of several inventors of the transmission of speech by electrical wires. He achieved patent primacy [...]
July 27, 1866: Trans-Atlantic Cable Connects Old World to New
July 27th, 2010 |
No Comments
1866: After years of planning, development and more than a few snafus, the trans-Atlantic cable is successfully laid and put into operation.
Telegraphic communication was in its infancy — it had only been 22 years since Samuel F.B. Morse made his historic transmission between Washington, D.C., and Baltimore — when the cable, stretching from Follhummerum Bay [...]
June 28, 1846: Parisian Inventor Patents Saxophone
June 28th, 2010 |
No Comments
1846: Emerging from his Paris workshop, musician-inventor Adolphe Sax files 14 patents for an instrument destined to revolutionize American music nearly a century later. His new invention: the saxophone.
Initially crafted from wood, Sax’s instruments flared at the tip to form a music-amplifying bell. Designed in seven sizes from sopranino to contrabass, the saxophone combined the [...]
June 24, 1812: Coal-Powered Locomotive Hauls Coal
June 24th, 2010 |
No Comments
1812: John Blenkinsop shows off the world’s first rack-and-pinion steam locomotive. Unlike other early steam locomotives, it will become a commercial success as a coal hauler.
Blenkinsop, the manager of the Middleton Colliery in West Yorkshire, England, was looking for a cheaper way to move coal from Middleton to Leeds. Supply requirements for the cavalry fighting in [...]
June 17, 1862: Worst Mashup Ever Has Farmers Tillin’ ‘n’ Killin’
June 17th, 2010 |
No Comments
1862: In the midst of the American Civil War, inventors W.H. Fancher and C.M. French of Waterloo, New York, successfully receive a patent for the “New and Improved Ordnance Plow,” a horse-drawn plow outfitted with a — get ready for it — firearm.
See also:
Photo Gallery
Mashup Inventions: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
Now, why would [...]
Mashup Inventions: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
June 16th, 2010 |
No Comments
<< previous image | next image >>
It’s the anniversary of what may be the worst invention combination in recorded history, a plow and a gun. So we asked the Wired.com staff to tell us about other inventive combos. Some are weird, some are wonderful.
See also:
This Day in TechJune 17, 1862: Worst Mashup Ever Has Farmers [...]
June 10, 1952: Marketing Mylar With a Film About a Film
June 10th, 2010 |
No Comments
runMobileCompatibilityScript(‘myExperience90680579001′, ‘anId’);
1952: DuPont registers Mylar as the trademark for its new, strong polyester film. Mylar’s versatility gives it a long, worldwide run as an industrial coating.
DuPont developed Mylar, or biaxially oriented polyethylene terephthalate, along with the polyester fabric Dacron in the early ’50s. Mylar’s resistance to tearing and stretching, to heat and [...]
June 9, 1902: Put a Nickel In, Take Your Food Out
June 9th, 2010 |
No Comments
1902: Joe Horn and Frank Hardart open the Automat at 818 Chestnut St. in Philadelphia. It’s America’s first coin-operated cafeteria.
Customers would put nickels into slots, turn a knob and open a little glass door to get their food. Horn and Hardart used Swedish-patented equipment they’d imported from Berlin, which already sported a successful “waiterless restaurant.”
See [...]
June 3, 1889: Power Flows Long-Distance
June 3rd, 2010 |
No Comments
1889: The first long-distance transmission of electricity takes place, linking a powerhouse at Willamette Falls to a string of lights in Portland, Oregon, 14 miles to the west.
The power lines stretching from the hydroelectric generator to 55 street lights at 4th and Main heralded the arrival of a major innovation in energy technology. The [...]
June 1, 1495: King James Will Have a Scotch, Good Sir
June 1st, 2010 |
No Comments
1495: The Scottish government records it has commissioned Friar Jon Cor to make Scotch whisky — the first mention in print of an elixir which has since brought down many a government, made friends of enemies and enemies of friends, lubricated good, great and bad writing, and … well, suffice it to say a touch [...]
May 18, 1952: Carbon-14 Sets Stonehenge Date at 1848 B.C., More or Less
May 18th, 2010 |
No Comments
1952: An analysis of the carbon-14 radioisotope in a piece of charred oak from an excavated pit at Stonehenge estimates that the mysterious structure on England’s Salisbury Plain is 3,800 years old, plus or minus 275 years.
The carbon-dating process that dated Stonehenge to about 1848 B.C. was conducted by the technique’s godfather, Willard Libby. The [...]