The Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention & Innovation

Who invented the electric guitar? Find out in our virtual exhibit.

Who invented the electric guitar? Find out in our virtual exhibit. GO »

	Educational materials »
	Research opportunities »
	Online articles »
	Archives »
	Oral & video histories »
	Books »
	Web sites »

Invention stories:
archives, articles, audio, and video

A subject guide to contemporary and historical inventors and inventions featured on the Lemelson Center and National Museum of American History Archives Center Web sites.
Above: A bright idea with a new twist--the compact fluorescent light bulb.

When you click on the links below, you will open a new browser window. To return to this page, close that window. To search for an inventor by name, use your browser's "find" command.

Key to links:
ARC	= Archives collection finding aid
ART	= Article
AV	= Audio/video clips
OVH	= Oral/video history collection finding aid
*	= finding aids located on the NMAH Archives Center's Web site

Click on a subject:

African American
inventors
Agriculture
Air & space
Architecture &
construction
Art
Assistive technology
Business
Chemistry
Computers
Electric light & power
Electron microscopy
Electronics
Environment

Food
Icons of invention
Industry &
manufacturing
Materials science
Medicine & health
Military
Music
Nobel Prize
Personal care
Pets
Photography & film
Physics
Plastics

Professional societies
Radio
Robotics
Sound Recording
Sports
Surveying
Telegraph
Telephone
Textiles & clothing
Timekeeping
Toys
Transportation
Women inventors

African American inventors
	Patricia Bath, inventor of the LaserPhaco laser eye surgery device	ARC ART OVH
	George Carruthers, inventor of the far-ultraviolet camera	ART OVH
	David Gittens, inventor of the Ikenga 5302 gyroplane	ART OVH
	Marjorie Stewart Joyner, inventor of the permanent waving machine for hair	ART
	Lewis Latimer, inventor of improved light bulb filaments	ART
	James McLurkin, inventor of robotic ants	ART1 ART2 ART3 AV OVH
	Garrett Morgan, gas mask and traffic signal inventor	ART
	Hildreth (Hal) Walker, inventor of laser devices and electromobiles (1995)	ART1 ART2 OVH
Back to the top

Agriculture
	Barbed wire fencing	ART
	Everett H. Bickley, who invented a seed sorting machine	ARC* ART
	Richard Adlard, who worked on drip system irrigation methods	ARC*
Back to the top

Air & space
	George Carruthers, inventor of the far-ultraviolet camera	ART OVH
	Corona spy camera	OVH
	Draper Family, pioneers in astronomical photography	ARC*
	David Gittens, inventor of the Ikenga 5302 gyroplane	ART OVH
	Paul MacCready, human-powered flying machine inventor	ART1 ART2 ART3 OVH
	Ellen Ochoa, NASA astronaut, scientist, and inventor in the field of optical processing	ART OVH
	Video history interviews documenting the development of space satellite manufacture at GE and RCA	OVH
Back to the top

Architecture & construction
	Andrew G. Butler, inventor of the SmartLevel, an electronic builder's level	ARC ART OVH
	Santiago Calatrava, artist, sculptor, engineer, and architect	ART
	Douglas Cardinal, innovative architect	ART
	Cass Gilbert, an American architect known for his commercial and public buildings, including the Woolworth Building in New York City	ARC*
	Subhendu Guha, inventor of flexible solar roofing shingles	ART OVH
	Chuck Hoberman, inventor of expandable domes and spheres	ART1 ART2 AV1 AV2 OVH
Back to the top

Art
	Arthur Ganson, kinetic sculptor and inventor of toys	ART AV1 AV2
	Artist Jules Olitski and paint manufacturer Mark Golden talk about the invention of new pigments	ART AV OVH
Back to the top

Assistive technology
	Mike Augspurger, inventor of an all-terrain handcycle	ART1 ART2 OVH
	Matt Capozzi and Nathan Connolly, who invented an accessible snowboard for people with a lower body disability	ARC* ART
	Jose Hernandez-Rebollar, inventor of the AcceleGlove that translates the alphabet and sign language into audible speech	ARC
	Krysta Morlan, waterbike inventor	ART
	Van Phillips, inventor of the Flex-Foot and other prosthetic feet	ARC ART
	Lon Safko, inventor of voice recognition software for the disabled	ARC
Back to the top

Business
	Lamson cash carrier video documentation of this mechanical means for moving cash, sales slips, and change, by way of overhead wires, between the sales clerks and the cashier	ART OVH
Back to the top

Chemistry
	Art Fry, Post-It® inventor	ART
	Harold Kroto, chemist and Nobel laureate who discovered the carbon structures called buckminsterfullerenes	ARC ART AV1 AV2 OVH
	Stephanie Kwolek, inventor of Kevlar®	ART1 ART2 OVH
	Patsy Sherman, inventor of Scotchgard®	ART1 ART2 OVH
	Henry Wurtz, a chemist and editor who contributed to both the theory and practice of chemistry	ARC*
Back to the top

Computers
	Ralph H. Baer, inventor of the home video game	ARC
	Computer Oral History Collection, audio interviews with people instrumental to the development of computing	ARC
	Grace Murray Hopper, who invented the compiler, a machine language critical to the development of computing	ARC*
	Gordon Goldstein, a computer engineer who worked on the UNIVAC 1	ARC
	Herb Grosch, an astronomer and early computer professional	ARC*
	Thomas Massie, inventor of a tactile interface for computers	ART1 ART2 OVH
	Microelectronics oral history interviews with pioneers in the field of microelectronics	OVH
	John Clifford Shaw, who developed one of the earliest list processing languages and an early interactive time-sharing program	ARC
	Linus Torvalds, Linux computer operating system founder	ART
	West Coast Computer Faire, an annual computer fair first held in 1977.	ARC
Back to the top

Electric light & power
	Saul Dushman, director of the Research Division of the Edison Lamp Works	ARC*
	Thomas Edison, inventor of the phonograph, incandescent light bulb, and more	ARC* ART1 ART2 ART3 AV1
	William J. Hammer, a consulting electrical engineer who worked with Thomas Edison on the incandescent light	ARC*
	Lewis Latimer, inventor of improved light bulb filaments	ART
	Kenneth M. Swezey, a writer and collector of materials about electrical inventor Nikola Tesla	ARC*
	Roman Szpur, high-efficiency wind turbine inventor	ART
	Elihu Thomson, a scientist, inventor, and electrical manufacturer of arc lighting, electric welding, and electrical manufacturing	ARC*
Back to the top

Electron microscopy
	Rubin Borasky, a scientist who documented the history of electron microscopy	ARC*
Back to the top

Electronics
	Pierre Curie, who was the first to observe the phenomenon of piezoelectricity	ART
	Nick Holonyak Jr., who demonstrated the first visible-light-emitting diode	ART
	Jack Kilby, co-inventor of the integrated circuit	ART
	Otto Lehmann, who, with Friedrich Reinitzer, discovered liquid crystals	ART
	Robert Noyce, co-inventor of the integrated circuit	ART
Back to the top

Environment
	Subhendu Guha, inventor of flexible solar roofing shingles	ART OVH
	United States Fish Commission, which carried out the first sustained study of marine biology in the United States	ARC*
Back to the top

Food
	Aladdin Industries Inc., inventor of the thermos bottle	ARC*
	Eskimo Pie Corp., makers of America's first chocolate covered ice cream bar, invented by Christian Kent Nelson	ARC*
	Joseph B. Friedman, inventor of the flexible drinking straw	ARC* ART
	Charlotte Cramer Sachs, an inventor of food and household products	ARC
	Percy Spencer, microwave intentor	ART
Back to the top

Icons of invention
	Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone	ART
	Thomas Edison, inventor of the phonograph, incandescent light bulb, and more	ART1 ART2 ART3 AV1
	Benjamin Franklin and the interplay between technology and democracy, discussed by author Walter Isaacson	AV1 AV2 AV3
	Samuel Morse, inventor of the electromagnetic telegraph	ART
Back to the top

Industry & manufacturing
	Felix P. ("Phil") Caruthers, an engineer who developed machines and systems for automated machine tools	ARC*
	Robert G. Chamberlain, one of the first numerical control programmers in the United States	ARC*
	Robert Scofield Condon, a mechanical engineer who invented pencil lead pointers, pencil sharpeners, milling machines, gear cutting machines, and other devices	ARC*
	Charles Eisler, who invented machinery for producing electric lamps, television and radio tubes, welding equipment, and laboratory equipment	ARC
	Edwin R. Fellows, founder of the Fellows Gear Shaper Co., a leader in precision gear production in the first half of the 20th century.	ARC
	H. Joseph Gerber, who invented the computer-controlled fabric cutter and other computer-controlled manufacturing equipment	ARC OVH
	IDEO, innovative product design team	ART
	Nathan Kane, inventor of low-distortion bellow folds	ART OVH
	Max Kronenberg, a research engineer who specialized in developing techniques for the machining of metals	ARC*
	Marvin Mundel, an expert in the fields of industrial engineering and time and motion studies	ARC
	Sendzimir steel mill video documenting the first "Z" mill for cold rolling stainless steel in the United States, invented by Tadeusz Sendzimir	OVH
	Orla E. Watson, who invented the telescoping shopping cart	ARC*
Back to the top

Materials science
	Orlan W. Boston, an engineer who studied the physical and chemical properties of metals	ARC*
	Nicholas C. Mandragos, a structural engineer and lecturer on photo elasticity	ARC*
Back to the top

Medicine & health
	Patricia Bath, inventor of the LaserPhaco laser eye surgery device	ARC ART OVH
	John C. Boyd, a U.S. Navy surgeon and honorary curator of medicine at the Smithsonian (1891-1892)	ARC*
	Charles F. Brannock, who invented the familiar Brannock foot-measuring device	ARC* ART
	Curt I. Civin, pediatric oncologist and stem cell researcher	OVH
	Gertrude Elion, Nobel laureate and inventor of targeted drugs	ART AV1 AV2
	Ashok Gadgil, inventor of UV Waterworks water purifier	ART1 ART2 AV1 AV2 OVH
	Wilson Greatbatch, inventor of the implantable cardiac pacemaker	ART1 ART2 AV OVH
	Robert Jarvik, inventor of artificial hearts	AV1
	Akhil Madhani, inventor of a robotic cardiac surgery instrument	ART1 ART2 OVH
	Moore-Stein protein sequencer video documentation of the sequencer, invented by Stanford Moore and William Stein, that enabled automatic analysis of protein structure	OVH
	William T.G. Morton, a discoverer of the anesthetic properties of ether	ARC*
	Henry Roger, inventor of the Lifwynn Eye-Movement Camera	ARC
	Sharon Rogone, who invents devices to help care for premature babies	ARC AV1 AV2
	Milton K. Wirtz, a pioneer in plastic eye prosthesis	ARC*
Back to the top

Military
	Corona spy camera	OVH
	Quartermaster Corps video documentation of the inventive research and development work of the Quartermasters	ART OVH
Back to the top

Music
	Analog music synthesizer oral history collection, documenting the pioneering engineers and musicians of the electronic music synthesizer from 1960 to 1970	OVH
	David Baker, music director of the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra, talks about sound and color	AV
	George Beauchamp, who, working with Adolph Rickenbacker, produced an electromagnetic pickup for the first commercially viable electric guitar	ART
	Country musician Junior Brown, who created the the "guit-steel" by combining a Spanish-style electric guitar and a lap-steel guitar	ART
	John Dopyera, who designed a steel-body guitar with banjo-type resonator- amplifiers built into the top	ART
	Electric guitar video documentation on the cultural significance of the electric guitar as instrument, technology, and symbol	ARC ART1 ART2 OVH
	Leo Fender, the first manufacturer to mass-produce Spanish-style solid-body electric guitars	ART
	John Hendricks, inventor of the jazz style known as "Vocalese"	AV
	Lloyd Loar, who developed an electrostatic pickup that sensed vibrations in the soundboard of stringed instruments	ART
	C.F. Martin, whose innovations in guitar construction and design led to a new American tradition of flattop guitar making	ART
	Ted McCarty, who designed the Gibson Les Paul, the Flying V, and the Explorer guitars, and patented numerous pickup devices	ART
	Les Paul, an innovator in solid-body electric guitars and inventor of recording techniques such as sound-on-sound	ART
	Adolph Rickenbacker, who, working with George Beauchamp, produced an electromagnetic pickup for the first commercially viable electric guitar	ART
	Floyd Rose, who improved solid-body guitar tremolo systems	ART
	Paul Reed Smith, innovative electric guitar maker	ART1 ART2
Back to the top

Nobel Prize
	Gertrude Elion, Nobel laureate and inventor of targeted drugs	ART AV1 AV2
	Harold Kroto, chemist and Nobel laureate who discovered the carbon structures called buckminsterfullerenes	ARC ART AV1 AV2 OVH
	Interviews with 33 Nobel laureates	ARC OVH
	William Phillips, Nobel laureate in physics	ARC ART AV1 AV2 OVH
	Charles Townes, Nobel laureate and inventor of the maser	ART OVH
Back to the top

Personal care
	Marion O'Brien Donovan, the "grandmother of the disposable diaper"	ARC* ART
	Marjorie Stewart Joyner, inventor of the permanent waving machine for hair	ART
	Nathaniel Mathis, an innovative hairstylist, entrepreneur, inventor, and community activist	ARC*
	Ann Moore, inventor of the Snugli baby carrier	ART1 ART2 AV
	Lydia O'Leary, Covermark® cosmetics inventor	ART
Back to the top

Pets
	Ruth Foster, coinventor of the Gentle Leader® dog collar	ART
Back to the top

Photography & film
	Draper Family, pioneers in astronomical photography	ARC*
	Henry Roger, inventor of the Lifwynn Eye-Movement Camera	ARC
	Stan Winston, special effects artist and robot inventor	AV1 AV2
Back to the top

Physics
	Louis Alvarez, inventor of a “bubble chamber” that made tiny particles inside an atom’s nucleus visible	ART
	F. C. Brown, a physicist and inventor who created and supervised the development of education exhibits	ARC
	William Phillips, Nobel laureate in physics	ARC ART AV1 AV2 OVH
	Ednor Rowe, who created "Tantalus," the first dedicated synchrotron radiation laboratory and source	ARC ART OVH
	The Superconducting Super Collider, a particle accelerator that, if built, would have been the world's most expensive instrument for basic science	ARC
	Serge Scherbatskoy, a petroleum geophysical engineer who held more than 200 patents worldwide in petroleum exploration	ARC
	Charles Townes, Nobel laureate and inventor of the maser	ART OVH
	Hildreth (Hal) Walker, inventor of laser devices and electromobiles (1995)	ART1 ART2 OVH
Back to the top

Plastics
	Celluloid Corp., the original plastics manufacturer	ARC*
	J. Harry DuBois, an industrial consultant in the field of petrochemicals and plastics	ARC*
	Earl S. Tupper, inventor of Tupperware	ARC*
Back to the top

Professional societies
	Society for the History of Technology, organized in 1958 to encourage the study of the development of technology and its relations with society and culture	ARC*
Back to the top

Radio
	George H. Clark, a radio engineer who documented the first 50 years of radio's history	ARC
	Edmund A. Laport, a director of broadcast engineering for RCA	ARC*
Back to the top

Robotics
	Akhil Madhani, inventor of a robotic cardiac surgery instrument	ART1 ART2 OVH
	James McLurkin, inventor of robotic ants	ART1 ART2 ART3 AV OVH
	Tom Newby, inventor of animatronics for the Muppets	AV
	Sebastian Thrun, head of the team that designed Minerva, the Robot Tour Guide	ART
	Stan Winston, special effects artist and robot inventor	AV1 AV2
Back to the top

Sound recording
	S. Joseph Begun, a pioneer in magnetic recording	ARC
	Charles Sumner Tainter, who invented the graphophone, a commercially practical dictating machine	ARC*
Back to the top

Sports
	Matt Capozzi and Nathan Connolly, who invented an accessible snowboard for people with a lower body disability	ARC* ART
	Albany Billiard Ball Co., makers of celluloid billiard balls	ARC*
	Mike Augspurger, inventor of an all-terrain handcycle	ART1 ART2 OVH
	John Bucheimer, manager of new product manufacturing at Head Ski Co.	ARC
	S. Newman Darby, who invented windsurfing	ARC* ART1 ART2 OVH
	Arthur Ehrat, who nvented a breakaway basketball rim	ARC
	John Fabel, Ecotrek™ backpack inventor	ART
	Howard Head, who invented the first metal laminate skis and tennis rackets with enlarged "sweet spots"	ARC* ART
	Leonard Karr, an avid fisherman and hunter who designed decoys, pit covers, a stake hole punch, and a kayak	ARC*
	Michael Zane, an entrepreneur who purchased the "Kryptonite" bicycle lock design and trade name, and developed the Kryptonite Corporation.	ARC
Back to the top

Surveying
	Robert Studebaker, inventor of the LaserPlane, an alternative to the liquid level	OVH
Back to the top

Telegraph
	Anglo-American Telegraph Co., Ltd., which laid and operated the first successful transatlantic telegraphic cable	ARC*
	Samuel Morse, inventor of the electromagnetic telegraph	ART
	Western Union Collection, documenting the evolution of the telegraph and the development of the Western Union Telegraph Co.	ARC
Back to the top

Telephone
	Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone	ART
Back to the top

Textiles & clothing
	Henry Booth, who invented the PhotoMetriC custom tailoring system	ARC
	George de Mestral, inventor of Velcro	ART
	Du Pont Nylon Collection, documenting the introduction of this synthetic fiber	ARC*
	Sally Fox, innovator of naturally colored cotton	ART1 ART2
	H. Joseph Gerber, who invented the computer-controlled fabric cutter and other computer-controlled manufacturing equipment	ARC OVH
	Stephanie Kwolek, inventor of Kevlar®	ART1 ART2 OVH
	Patsy Sherman, inventor of Scotchgard®	ART1 ART2 OVH
Back to the top

Timekeeping
	Atomic Clock Collection, documenting the development of the first commercial atomic clocks	ARC
	John Bergey, who headed the team that produced the first electronic digital watch	ART
	Robert Biard, who, with Gary Pittman, invented the infrared light-emitting diode	ART
	Richard F. Bond clock escapement video, documenting a succession of clock escapements invented by Bond in the 19th century	OVH
	Walter Guyton Cady, who developed the first quartz crystal resonator	ART
	Centre Electronique Horloger, which developed the first quartz watches in Switzerland	ART
	Pierre Curie, who was the first to observe the phenomenon of piezoelectricity	ART
	James Fergason, who developed the liquid crystal display that became standard in quartz watches	ART
	Max Forrer, who headed the Centre Electronique Horloger (CEH) Circuits Section, the part of the laboratory that developed the first Swiss quartz watch prototypes	ART
	Armin Frei, who investigated using a miniaturized quartz crystal as a time standard for wristwatches	ART
	Hamilton Watch Company, which produced the first commercially-available digital quartz watch	ART
	George Heilmeier, who headed the team that invented the first practical liquid crystal displays	ART
	Jean Hermann, who, with technician François Niklès, developed a stepping micromotor to turn quartz watch hands	ART
	Max Hetzel, who invented the Accutron, the first tuning fork watch	ART
	Nick Holonyak Jr., who demonstrated the first visible-light-emitting diode	ART
	Kurt Hübner, who set up a complete microelectronics laboratory at the Centre Electronique Horloger (CEH) to fabricate low power integrated circuits for quartz watches	ART
	Jack Kilby, co-inventor of the integrated circuit	ART
	Otto Lehmann, who, with Friedrich Reinitzer, discovered liquid crystals	ART
	Rolf Lochinger, who designed circuits quartz watches	ART
	Nunzio Luce, who headed the team that developed the first LCD digital quartz watch	ART
	Harold Lyons, a physicist whose primary interest was in atomic frequency standards and atomic clocks	ARC
	Warren Marrison, who developed the first quartz clock	ART
	François Niklès, who, with Jean Hermann, developed a micromotor to turn quartz watch hands	ART
	Robert Noyce, co-inventor of the integrated circuit	ART
	Henri Oguey, who developed a vibrating micromotor to turn quartz watch hands	ART
	George Washington Pierce, who developed designs for quartz oscillator circuits	ART
	Gary Pittman, who, with Robert Biard, invented the infrared light-emitting diode	ART
	Quartz watch oral history interviews with individuals crucial to the invention of the quartz watch	ART OVH
	Friedrich Reinitzer, who, with Otto Lehmann, discovered liquid crystals	ART
	Seiko, the company that made the first commercially-available quartz analog watch	ART
	Juergen Staudte, who invented a method for mass-producing quartz crystal oscillators	ART
	Eric Vittoz, who demonstrated the use of quartz as a time base in a small clock	ART
	Roger Wellinger, the first director of the Centre Electronique Horloger (CEH), who committed the lab to work with the new technology of integrated circuits	ART
Back to the top

Toys
	Ralph H. Baer, inventor of the home video game	ARC
	Binney & Smith Inc., manufacturer of Crayola wax crayons, chalk, ink, paint, pigments, and Silly Putty	ARC*
	Donald Duncan and Pedro Flores, who popularized the yo-yo	ART
	Arthur Ganson, kinetic sculptor and inventor of toys	ART AV1 AV2
	Joseph Pedott, creator of the Chia Pet and the Clapper	ARC
	Janese Swanson, inventor of technology toys for girls	ART OVH
Back to the top

Transportation
	Charles Adler, Jr., inventor of an electric automotive brake	ARC*
	Containerization oral history collection, documenting the development of containerized shipping	OVH
	Jerry Hirshberg, founder of Nissan Design International	ART
	Garrett Morgan, gas mask and traffic signal inventor	ART
	Hildreth (Hal) Walker, inventor of laser devices and electromobiles (1995)	ART1 ART2 OVH
	George Eli Whitney, an engineer and inventor who developed many applications of steam power, including bicycles, cars, and boats	ARC*
	William E. Woodard, an inventor of locomotive equipment	ARC
Back to the top

Women inventors
	Patricia Bath, inventor of the LaserPhaco laser eye surgery device	ARC ART OVH
	Gertrude Elion, Nobel laureate and inventor of targeted drugs	ART AV1 AV2
	Exploring the History of Women Inventors	ART
	Marjorie Stewart Joyner, inventor of the permanent waving machine for hair	ART
	Stephanie Kwolek, inventor of Kevlar®	ART1 ART2 OVH
	Ann Moore, inventor of the Snugli baby carrier	ART1 ART2 AV
	Krysta Morlan, waterbike inventor	ART
	Ellen Ochoa, NASA astronaut, scientist, and inventor in the field of optical processing	ART OVH
	Lydia O'Leary, Covermark® cosmetics inventor	ART
	Sharon Rogone, who invents devices to help care for premature babies	ARC AV1 AV2
	Patsy Sherman, inventor of Scotchgard®	ART OVH
	Janese Swanson, inventor of technology toys for girls	ART OVH
Back to the top

Last Update: 26 Mar 2008

:: Home :: About Us :: Centerpieces :: Events :: Resources :: Video & Audio ::
::