Inventors That Changed America: Strong Connection

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Strong Connections — Thomas Edison still holds the record for patents – he held 1,093 patents and claimed countless inventions, including many that changed our lives: the incandescent light bulb, the phonograph, and the first movie camera. Alexander Graham Bell developed the first version of the telephone in 1876, and his invention still has people all over the world talking more than a century later. Guglielmo Marconi invented the radio, which entered America’s living rooms as the primary source of entertainment early in the 20th century. His invention also saved lives on the Titanic. Software engineer Tim Berners-Lee invented software that became the World Wide Web, which debuted in 1991 and allowed for the universal exchange of information from any digital port.

Brave New World — Physicist Gordon Gould discovered lasers, which are used for such diverse purposes as buying groceries, correcting vision, and sending packages. Chemist Leo Baekeland discovered one of the most important products of the 20th century – plastic. Alan Turing invented computers, originally to crack German code during World War II. Now we use computers in nearly every facet of our lives. Leo Szilard developed the theory of chain reaction and worked with the Manhattan Project to develop the atomic bomb. When the United States dropped the bomb on Hiroshima in 1945, the event helped shape the modern world. In 1947, William Shockley contributed one of the greatest inventions of the modern world – the transistor, which revolutionized electronics, from cell phones to computers and radios to rockets.