Happy Bunsen Burner Day

While few, if any, Tulare County inventors used a Bunsen burner to develop their creations, the burner in itself was an enduring innovation that helped transform science.

The long hollow tube that was used to combine gas and air to create a flame for heat was created by German chemist Robert Wilhelm Eberhard von Bunsen. He was born on March 31, 1811.

If you are a high school student, you know all about the Bunsen burner. If you work in a chemistry laboratory, chances are you use the burner in your job. If it's been a while since high school chemistry class, the memory of the Bunsen burner may have faded somewhat.

Caught with his pants down

Going to the bathroom in the comfort and privacy of your own home, or in any building for that matter, is a relatively new convenience of modern living.

As recently as the mid- to late-1800s, engineers and tinkerers were still trying to master the art of a flushing toilet. And towns were still devising ways to dispense with the waste.

For John Dihrberg of Visalia, the indoor "water closet" solved one inconvenience but only gave rise to another - bathroom bargers. In 1890 he patented a way of letting people know when a toilet was in use.

"This invention has for its object the doing away with that annoyance which attaches to water-closets, especially in hotels and boarding-houses, owing to the absence of anything to indicate from the exterior when said closets are occupied or vacant.

"Many of such closets are not provided with interior hooks or bolts to secure the occupant from intrusion, as such fastenings are in many cases objectionable and have even necessitated the breaking in of the door in case of sickness of the occupant, or when from other reasons the closet has been unduly long occupied, while if the closet-door only be shut to and not bolted or hooked occupants are frequently exposed to the annoyance of attempted intrusion by others, which is equally annoying to the intruders," he wrote of his invention.

Little did Dihrberg know that his invention would be adapted for use on airplane bathroom doors and porta-potties.

More than I could have imagined

As a former journalist, I made it a habit to dig through databases, government documents and other publicly available resources hoping to find an interesting nugget worth a story.

Inevitably, I always found something. I reveled in the search and the discovery. I felt I was a paid treasure hunter.

I'm no longer on a regular payroll for such endeavors, but I just can't keep myself from the hunt. I was scavenging through obscure online databases nearly two years ago when I stumbled upon patents. Leaving no stone unturned is a hallmark of good research, so I gave it a go not expecting to find much, if anything.

Tulare County is famous for a few things. Producing inventors isn't one of them.

I couldn't have been more wrong - and I can't tell you how pleased it made me to discover this on my own.

Not only has Tulare County produced a bumper crop of inventors; it appears no other surrounding county holds a candle to the brilliant light of innovation emanating from this area.

I'm still compiling a detailed database on inventors stretching back to the 1880s. So far, I'm up over 250 inventions, representing nearly 200 men and women inventors.

I told the story of one contemporary inventor - Marie Logan (pictured above) - in a cover story for Tulare County Magazine. 

What's more interesting than simply the sheer number and diversity of inventions is the history and personal stories behind some of the names on the list. It would be all too easy to compile the list and present it for mass consumption, but I think that would be a disservice to this rich history of ingenuity. So I'm hoping some extra research by myself and some help from readers will further broaden our understanding of this county's decades-long drive to create and innovate.

Visalia headlight wiper one of the first

It's not unusual to see headlight wipers on some luxury-class autos these days, but if Visalia inventor Charles B. Baughn had his way the wipers would have been common even back in the 1940s.

From the artist's rendering on the top image you can see the front portion of the vehicle's grill and the bullet-style headlamp that was mounted on the fender.

The wiper was a propeller-looking mechanism that spun to wipe off road grime and water from the headlight glass.

In 1942, Baughn described his invention as "a wiper which will be automatically operated by air currents when the vehicle is in motion.

"A further object is to provide a wiper which will clean off moisture, dirt or other particles, such as insects, dust or snow, which gather on the glass fronts of automobiles during their operation.

A further object is to provide a device of the class described, which will be simple in operation, economical in construction, and readily adapted to standard equipment," Baughn said in his patent application.

Since Baughn's design, other inventors have come up with variations on the theme.

Apparently it wasn't until 1970 that headlight wipers were used on production autos. Saab was the first. Other European models have followed suit.

For a look at Saab's design, see their history page here.

Baughn's wiper design is interesting because it is reminiscent of his first patented invention - a propeller for an airplane. In 1931, he patented a propeller blade. What made this propeller blade unique was that its pitch would be adjusted by the air pressure against it to optimize thrust.