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May 15,1940 The Vought-Sikorsky corporation successfully flight-tests the first working helicopter.
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The Atanasoff Berry Computer (ABC) is the first prototype digital computer. Built at Iowa State University, it was built by a physics professor. Sadly, it does not work.
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in 1942, The first American jet aircraft, the Bell P59-A is tested at Muroc Army Base in California. It was built for WW2, and was a single seat, twin engine fighter aircraft.
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In Oak Ridge, Tennessee, the secret Manhattan Project laboratory produces a few milligrams of plutonium, the radioactive substance needed to make an atomic bomb.
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The "camera-and-film" system is invented by Edwin Land. It later goes on sale as the Polaroid Land Camera, the first camera to develop its own photographs.