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Steam Engine
A heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid. The steam engine uses the force produced by steam pressure to push a piston back and forth inside a cylinder. -
The Spinny Jenny
In 1764 Hargreaves built what became known as the Spinning-Jenny. The machine used eight spindles onto which the thread was spun from a corresponding set of rovings. -
Steamboat
A Scotsman named James Watt invented an engine that was run by steam. Once inventors learned about the steam engine they began to experiment with using it to run boats. The first man to build a steamboat in the United States was John Fitch. Because they were so expensive, his steamboats were unsuccessful. -
Power Loom
Developed by Edmund Cartwright in 1784 and completed in 1785. Traditional hand looms were slow and required several laborers to operate. Cartwright's invention of the power loom was significant because it used mechanization to automate much of the weaving process. -
Sewing Machine
Thomas Saint invented the first sewing machine design, but he did not successfully advertise or market his invention. An Austrian tailor, Josef Madersperger, began developing his first sewing machine in 1807 and presented his first working machine in 1814. -
Cotton Gin
Eli Whitney patented the cotton gin, a machine that revolutionized the production of cotton by greatly speeding up the process of removing seeds from cotton fiber -
Photograph
A French inventor Joseph Nicéphore Niepce came up with the idea of using a petroleum derivative called "Bitumen of Judea" to record the camera's projection. Bitumen hardens with exposure to light, and the unhardened material could then be washed away -
Telegraph
Developed in the 1830s and 1840s by Samuel Morse and other inventors, the telegraph revolutionized long-distance communication. It worked by transmitting electrical signals over a wire laid between stations. -
Automobile
Wheeled passenger vehicle that carries its own motor. Most definitions of the term specify that automobiles are designed to run primarily on roads, to have seating for one to six people, typically have four wheels, and be constructed principally for the transport of people rather than goods. -
Dynamite
Alfred Nobe created an explosive device called a blasting cap, which inaugurated the modern use of high explosives -
Locomotive
A non-fiction book written primarily in free verse, the book follows a family as they ride a transcontinental steam engine train in summer of 1869. The book details the workers, passengers, landscape, and effects of building and operating the first transcontinental railroad. -
Telephone
Alexander Graham Bell is most well known for inventing the telephone. He came to the U.S as a teacher of the deaf, and conceived the idea of "electronic speech" while visiting his hearing-impaired mother in Canada. When he was eleven, Bell invented a machine that could clean wheat.
