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Steamboat
Several forms if steamboats were made in early 1700's, when it was officially made can be disputed depending which models one would consider the modern steamboat. Steamboats shaped America and boosted the economy because of the jobs it offered to manage the ships, and to dig the canals for them to travel on if a river was not available. It allowed fast shipment of goods before the time of trains and cars. -
Electricity
Although the idea of electricy had been introduced and studied by scientist before Ben Franklin, his famous experiment with a key attached to a kite proved that lightning carried electricity and led to further scientific discoveries. -
Cotton Gin
The cotton gin allowed plantation owners to separate the cotton from the sharp seeds which were known to cut the hands of workers/slaves which caused infection. It was safer and far more efficient, which led to mass expansion of the cotton industry and everntually led to surplus. -
Steam Engine
The steam engine replaced horse-drawn carts and could get you places more efficently. -
Telegraph brought to the US
Was used for communication at long distances. -
Combine Reaper-Thresher (Combine)
The "Combine" was dragged by horses and reaped and bagged wheat. -
Morse Code
A revolutionary way to transmit messages, morse code allowed people send messages great distances in seconds. It is the predecessor of the telephone, and saw wide use in war between commanding officrs, and in everyday life if a message simply needed to be sent. -
Repeating Rifle
A new type of fire arm developed sometime around the civil war. It used a lever to put the next bullet into the firing chamber, which allowed soldiers to fire several rounds before having to reload, unlike the single shot rifles/muskets before. They changed war forever and also aided the Union in their victory over the South in the Civil War because they could afford to use these high tech rifles, which they did, giving them the upper hand as far as fire power went. -
Moving Picture
New source of entertainment. Started movie industry. -
Perfected Barbed Wire
Was used to keep cowboys and cattle off of private land. -
Mimeograph
Made printing more efficient. -
Light Bulb
Provided light; more so than the candle. -
Twine Binder
The Twine Binder was used to tie bundles of wheat. -
Maxim Gun
The Maxim Gun was the first self-powered maching gun. It changed warfare forever. It immensley impacted the fighting styles of WWI and the Spanish American War. -
Automobile
New form of transportation which was beneficial for short-term distances. -
Submarine
The first self powered, self operated, and self sub/emerging submarine was named the "Fenian Ram." Before then, all submarines were aided by boats or ropes. The invention of this modern submarine led to significant changes in warfare, most significantly with the German U-Boat, and eventually its impacts in the cold war and modern warfare. -
Airplane
The airplane made an extraordinary contribution to the world. It changed war entirely by allowing fighting in the air, along with another way to bomb, which is primarily used today. It also led to the most popular means of long distance tranportation today. -
Assembly Line
The assembly line has no single inventor, however it was made famous by Ford in 1908. Before Ford's use, most manufactured goods or their parts were made one at a time by a craftsman or team of craftsmen. With the assembly line, machines and individuals would handle one step of the production process, which maximized efficiency. -
Panama Canal
The Panama Canal greatly changed the American military and economy. It saved the navy a great amount of time by allowing it to sail from the Pacific to the Atlantic (or vice versa) without going all the way around South America. It also made trade faster and easier. America was able to charge a fee on other countries who wanted to pass through it also. -
"Monitor-Top" refrigerator
Basically the first refrigerator to be used widespread in the world. It played a big role in American life. It allowed families to store meats cheeses vegetables and fruits along with milk without it going bad. -
Television
Although certain models had been made in the past. The first full time working televisions was invented in 1928. It revolutionized American life by spreading ideals and by bringing families together once a week to watch their favorite shows which usually supported family values -
Radar
Revolutionized in 1935, radar became a tool that could detect aircraft and ships from places they cannot see. It changed WWII, and aided the Americans in finding German U-Boats under the ocean -
HellCat
The Grumman F6F Hellcat was made to replace the wildcat over the pacific. Its design took into account Japanese tactics and flight patterns which made it superior over the skies. It is said to be the most successful naval airplane because it sunk the most airplanes in naval history, 5271 -
Mechanized cotton picker
Becoming popular in America during WWII after it was perfected, the cotton picker made picking cotton substantially more efficient and led to many blacks migrating North because they could not find work on farms in the South. -
atomic bomb
The atomic bomb was the most powerful weapon in the world. It ultimately ended WWII and is the underlying cuase of the cold war -
Hydrogen Bomb
Being nearly 450 times more powerful than the atomic bombs dropped in World War II, the H bomb created even more tension between America and the USSR. Took -
Sputnik
Sputnik was the first ever satellite sent into space by the USSR. It was a huge defeat for American in the space race and the cold war, but did lead to the creation of NASA and inspired American scientists to step it up and thrust America ahead of the Russians in the space race. -
Tear Gas
Although it was invented some time around 1915, its use wasnt extremely popular until the 1960s. Due to the mass amount of riots in the 60s becuase of race, the war and police brutality, it saw a lot of use -
Agent Orange
A gas used to kill certain plants in the Vietnamese jungles with the hope that it would leave no place for the Vietcong to hide and to shorten the food supply for the Vietcong. However it turned out to be extremely contreversial when poisoned the food of the civilians and created many long term issuesfor later generations
