Did You Know...
...that the inventor of the electric motor was a blacksmith named Thomas Davenport? Described as "a brilliantly unsuccessful inventor", Davenport invented the first rotary electric motor. In 1836 he headed out -- on foot -- from his Vermont home to file a patent application at the Patent Office in Washington, D.C. By the time he got there, he had squandered away his money and couldn't afford the $30 filing fee so he turned around and went home. When he later mailed in his application with money he'd raised, the Patent office was destroyed in a fire. He did finally get credit for his invention on Feb. 5, 1837.
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| Number | Title | Issue Date |
| 6929110 | Coin chute with optical coin discrimination Systems and techniques for providing an improved coin acceptor are described. In one aspect, an electronic coin acceptor exaggerates relatively small differences in coin diameters. A coin deposited into the coin acceptor passes along a coin path through two sensing ... | 08/16/2005 |
| 4741426 | Coin acceptor for vending machine A coin acceptor includes first and second members initially spaced apart from one another and frictionally carrying a third member having a coin selectively positioned thereon. Moving the first and second members toward one another causes relative displac... | 05/03/1988 |
| 4629051 | Coin sorting device A coin sorting device is designed to inhibit tampering with a coin operated machine by means of a wire, metal tape or the like, and to further prevent non-acceptable coins from being accepted by the coin-operated machine. The various embodiments of the de... | 12/16/1986 |
| 4365701 | Newspaper vending machine A coin-operated newspaper vending machine comprising a cabinet with a lower forwardly opening discharge opening and a flat forwardly and upwardly inclined support plate in the cabinet space above and rearward of the opening, a vertical stack of newspapers... | 12/28/1982 |
| 4136764 | Multiple compartment bread vending machine The embodiment of the invention disclosed herein is directed to a bread vending machine used for storing, displaying and selectively dispensing a plurality of packaged food articles, such as bread. The vending apparatus includes a housing structure having... | 01/30/1979 |
| 4050562 | Banknote escrow and stacker apparatus and method A currency handling machine receives a banknote and transports it in tension to an escrow container for temporary storage in a stack along with any other banknotes involved in a transaction until the customer instructs the machine to either complete the t... | 09/27/1977 |
