WOMEN AS INVENTORS.

Waipa Post, Volume XXIV, Issue 1419, 23 October 1923, Page 2

WOMEN AS INVENTORS.

SOME LABOUR-SAVING DEVICES. The natural sphere of a woman is supposed to be in the home superintending the housework, directing the cooking, and, more especially, bringing up her children. But after she has discharged all these duties she must have some time to spare, judging by the experiences of patent agents, who are forever receiving from the fair sex suggestions for all manner of novel labour-saving devices as well as many intricate inventions for which a patent is desired, all thought out without assistance, and mostly possessed of real merit. A dainty hat must hide some very prolific first quality "grey matter," one is inclined to think, when a smartly dressed lady boldly walks into one's office and proudly places on the table a fearfully and wonderfully made model representative of something that everybody wants, yet which has never before been thought of.

Not many weeks ago a woman inventor —or should she be called an inventress. —journeyed MOO miles to London in order to secure advice regarding the protection of a piece of apparatus wherewith five saucepans, two kettles, and various dishes coulo he simultaneously heated on the stove with only the gas that burned in one tiny jet. Foiling the Burglar. Nearly all the "gadgets" invented by women are of a mechanical nature; they rarely trouble to design little useful odds and ends that might be employed in the boudoir. Perhaps feminine fear of burglars is responsible for many 'cute contraptions intended to foil the purpose of thieves, one of such a character recently submitted by a housewife, being quite unique, and doubtless effective. The "inventress" assumed that Bill Sykes would not try to enter via the street door, but would endeavour to gain admittance by forcing open a window. Having got inside the room, no matter where he alighted, within a radius of three yards, he would be compelled to disturb a "trip-wire," which would set in motion the works of a gramophone in a bedroom and also one in the room that had been entered. It. was hoped that this latter would frighten him away ere the awakened householder came down to investigate matters!

Another woman with a versatile brain has evidently decided that fowls would lay more eggs if they could be persuaded that the sun was always shining and has devised a henhouse in which are a number of miniature "suns" the rays from which pour down night and day imparting a soft yellow glow to the whole interior. This is not a new idea but its application and mechanical mode of operation was really clever.

A bed that folds up and goes into a drawer a kettle that turns the gas out when it has boiled a shoe with a detachable heel for tennis-players, a perambulator that can be taken to pieces to carry upstairs, and a device for drying wet linen in a few minutes are only a very few of the hundreds of ideas submitted for examination by women who hoped to make a fortune out of them. Some of the inventions for which ladies have been responsible, though not feasible in their present form, contain the germ of what may later prove to be wonderful discoveries. This might be said of a scheme evolved by the wife of an engineer for transmitting by telegraph correct representations of handwriting. Unfortunately, several essential factors had not been considered in this case, but there may come a time when the method, much improved, may be adopted throughout the world. Those Missing 1 Details. Too often a woman will become so excited because she thinks she has invented something remarkable that she will not apply herself to working out detail matters, in consequence of which her idea "goes down." She is always afraid that someone else may also patent what she has devised ere her own design has been protected. It is also difficult to restrain feminine impetuosity at such times as when an idea has been submitted which possesses not the ghost of a chance of being commercially successful. It may be very clever, and often is, but the public do not always appreciate brains and brainy products, no matter whether a woman happens to have inspired them or a man. The successful inventor is one who only evolves what people want and have not got. If only women would bear this in mind, ,w'hat a lot of disappointments they would save themselves!