For Marion Donovan, a Connecticut mother of two, an endless parade of soggy cloth diapers spurred what would become a million dollar idea. The year was 1946 and options for diapers were sub-par: wicking cloth or rash-inducing rubber. So Donovan devised a solution.
She clipped out a section of her shower curtain to create a moisture-proof but breathable cover for her babies’ bottoms. These “boaters” became an instant commercial hit. Donovan wasn’t finished yet. She set out to replace cloth diapers all together with absorbent and disposable paper. At the time, manufacturers didn’t take the idea seriously. But in the 1960s, tapping in to Donovan’s vision, Proctor and Gamble engineer Victor Mills introduced the world to Pampers.
But this is only one example. See if you can identify these 10 inventions—all part of the National Museum of American History’s collection—by studying the drawings the inventors filed with their patents.
…And check out the official Manufacturing Day site here!
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7:30pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
