INCOMES OF SUCCESSFUL INVENTORS.

Pelorus Guardian and Miners' Advocate., Volume 17, Issue 5, 20 January 1903, Page 2

INCOMES OF SUCCESSFUL INVENTORS.

— It is generally believed that inventors are a class of unfortunate individuals, who struggle through life surrounded by an insurmountable barrier of penury and misfortune. This doubtless, is true in many cases, but the obverse of the picture is gratifying and full of encouragement.

.Some of the largest fortunes appear to have been derived from the invention of trivialities and novelties, such as the once popular toy known as “Dancing Jimcrow,”

which for several years is said to have yielded its patentee an annual income of upwards of £15,000. The sale of another toy “ John Gilpin,” enriched its lucky inventor to the extent of £20,000 a year as long as it continued to enjoy the unexpected popularity that greeted it when first placed upon the market. Mr. Plimpton, the inventor of the roller skatci made £200,000 out of the roller' skate and the gentleman who first thought of placing a rubber tip on the top of pencils made quite £20,000 a year by means of his simple improvement. When Harvey Kennedy introduced the shoe-lace he made £500,000 and the ordinary umbrella benefited six people by as much as £2,000,000. Sir Josiah Mason, the inventor of THE IMPROVED STEEL PEN, made an enormous fortune and on his death, English, and especially Birmingham, charities, benefited to the extent of hundreds of thousands of pounds. He was one of the most generous of men, and during his life gave enormous sums to hospitals and industrial schools.

The patentee of the pen for shading in different coloi.rs derived a yearly income of about £40,000 from this ingenious contrivance. It is stated that the wooden ball with an clastic attached % yielded ' over £IO,OOO a year.

Many readers will remember a legal action which took place some years ago when in the course of the evidence it transpired that the inventor of the metal plates for protecting the soles and heels of boots from wear sold 12,000,000 plates in 1879 and in 1887 the number reach, ed a total of 143,000,000 which realised profits of £230,000 for a year.

Women seem to also possess the inventive faculty ( says Ansley Irvine, in the “ Scientific American” ) The lady who invented the modern baby carriage enriched herself to the extent of £IO,OOO ; and a young lady living at Port Elizabeth South Africa, devised the simple toilet requisite known as the ” Mary Anderson ” curling iron, from which she derives royalties amounting to over £IOO a year. The gimlet-pointed screw, THE IDEA OF A LITTLE GIRL, brought many millions of dollars to the clever inventor. Miss Knight, a young lady of exceptional talents, was gifted with wonderful mechanical powers, as will be seen by the complicated mechanism of her machine for making paper bags. We are told she refused £IO,OOO for .it after taking out.the patent.

The machine with which the Brothers Morley, in the latter days of the eighteenth century, made their enormous fortune in the stocking loom, invented three generations

earlier by the Rev, William Lee, a Fellow of St. John’s College, Cambridge. Lee’s life story is full of sadness. According to one account, Lee, falling in love with and marrying an innkeeper’s daughter lost his Fellowship and was reduced to extreme poverty. The wife knitted stockings for a living and the husband, watching by her side as she worked, watched the intricate movements of her hands, and was thereby led to speculate on the possibility of constructing a machine that would do the work more expeditiously. Lee came to grief because his machine was believed to be a device lor throwing people out of work. He went ultimately to France, where he died poor and friendless, a disappointed man.

It is hard to realise that the

ART OF PERFORATING PAPER

was unknown 50 years ago. Prior to 1854 postage stamps were issued in sheets, the purchaser having to cut them up in the way he found most convenient to himself. In 1848, an Irishman, named Archer introduced a machine for cutting small slits round each stamp This was tried by the English Postal authorities, but for some unexplain-

ed reason it did not work to thensatisfaction, and, notwithstanding that Archer went to great trouble and expense in altering the machine so as to meet the objections, it was refused by the Government. Archer then constructed an entirely new machine which cut out circular holes. He received sufficient encouragement to induce him to further improve his invention, when in 185$, after three years’ continual labour the Treasury proposed to buy the patent rights for £6OO. This parsimonious offer was of course refused, as Archer had spent considerably more than that on his various experimental machines. Eventually the matter was placed before the Select Committee of the House of Commons, and the pettinacious inventor was awarded £4, 000 which, considering his apparatus in a few years saved the Government many thousands of pounds was not excessive.