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Benjamin Franklin invents the lighting rod
Benjamin Franklin wanted his experiment to be practical, so he developed the lightning rod. A tall rod is attached to the outside wall of the house. (https://www.thoughtco.com/18th-century-timeline-1992474) -
Samuel Johnson publishes the first English dictionary
was published in two volumes in 1755, six years later than planned but remarkably quickly for so extensive an undertaking.(https://www.britannica.com/biography/Samuel-Johnson) -
John Harrison invents the navigational clock
For the next few years Harrison worked in Barrow upon Humber on a marine timekeeper, now known as H1, probably helped by his brother, James. After testing the clock on the river Humber, Harrison proudly brought it to London. (https://www.rmg.co.uk/discover/explore/longitude-found-john-harrison) -
James Hargreaves invents the spinning jenny
About 1764 Hargreaves is said to have conceived the idea for his hand-powered multiple spinning machine when he observed a spinning wheel that had been accidentally overturned by his young daughter Jenny. (https://www.britannica.com/biography/James-Hargreaves) -
Joseph Priestly invents carbonated water
In 1767, the well reputed English chemist Joseph Priestley who was the first to artificially carbonate water by hanging a filled vessel over a fermentation vat at a brewery in Leeds (http://www.drinkingcup.net/1767-from-volcanos-to-soda-pop/) -
James Watt invents the improved steam engine
While repairing a model Newcomen steam engine in 1764, Watt was impressed by its waste of steam. In May 1765, after wrestling with the problem of improving it, he suddenly came upon a solution—the separate condenser, his first and greatest invention.Shortly afterward he met British physician, chemist, and inventor John Roebuck, the founder of the Carron Works, who urged him to make an engine. He entered into partnership with him in 1768.(https://www.britannica.com/biography/James-Watt) -
David Bushnell invents a submarine
Graduated from Yale in 1775, at the outbreak of the American Revolution, he went to Saybrook, where he built a unique turtle-shaped vessel designed to be propelled under water by an operator who turned its propeller by hand. (https://www.britannica.com/biography/David-Bushnell) -
Benjamin Franklin invents the bi-focal glasses
Franklin found that his eyesight was getting worse as he got older, and he grew both near-sighted and far-sighted. Tired of switching between two pairs of eyeglasses, he invented “double spectacles,” or what we now call bifocals. He had the lenses from his two pairs of glasses sliced in half horizontally and then remade into a single pair (https://www.fi.edu/benjamin-franklin/inventions) -
The Montgolfier brothers invent the hot air balloon.
Joseph-Michel and Jacques-Étienne Montgolfier, also called the Montgolfier brothers, were French brothers who were pioneer developers of the hot-air balloon and who conducted the first untethered flights. Modifications and improvements of the basic Montgolfier design were incorporated in the construction of larger balloons that, in later years, opened the way to exploration of the upper atmosphere. (https://www.britannica.com/biography/Montgolfier-brothers) -
Jean Pierre Blanchard invents a working parachute
During the 1770s Blanchard worked on the design of heavier-than-air flying machines, Ever the showman, Blanchard tossed a dog equipped with an experimental parachute over the side of a balloon and later tried parachute jumping himself. He also unsuccessfully tried using sails to add maneuverability and facilitate propulsion in balloons. (https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jean-Pierre-Francois-Blanchard) -
John Fitch invents the steamboat
Scraping together private investments and racing ahead of his competitors, Its distinguishing feature was a rack of canoe-like paddles, inspired by the sight years earlier of a canoe full of Indian warriors racing through the water. He took it to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in summer 1787, hoping to impress the delegates and garner financial backing. He left only with words of praise.
(http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/theymadeamerica/whomade/fitch_hi.html) -
William Murdoch invents gas lighting
At his home in Redruth, Cornwall, he experimented in distilling coal and in 1792 lighted his cottage and offices with coal gas. After returning to Birmingham about 1799, he perfected further practical methods for making, storing, and purifying gas. (https://www.britannica.com/biography/William-Murdock-Scottish-inventor) -
Alessandro Volta invents the battery
Known as the voltaic pile or the voltaic column, Volta’s battery consisted of alternating disks of zinc and silver (or copper and pewter) separated by paper or cloth soaked either in salt water or sodium hydroxide. A simple and reliable source of electric current that did not need to be recharged like the Leyden jar, his invention quickly led to a new wave of electrical experiments. (https://www.britannica.com/biography/Alessandro-Volta)
