Lecture 9
Technology in America
Early 19th Century
• Eli Whitney – invention of the cotton gin
• John H. Hall – American system of production
• Cyrus H. McCormick – invention of mechanical
reaper
• The Stevens Family – improving railroads and
transportation
• Samuel F.B. Morse – invention of telegraph
code
• Alexander Graham Bell – invention of telephone
Late 19th Century
• Thomas A. Edison
– invention of the
system of motion
picture, the
phonograph, the
electric bulb. He
was called “The
Wizard of Menlo
Park”.
Late 19th Century
• Frederick Winslow
Taylor – Scientific
Management
Late 19th Century
• Henry Ford – the Assembly Line
Early 20th Century
• Lee De Forest –
invention of vacuum
tube
Early 20th Century
• David Sarnoff pioneer of American
commercial radio and
television.
• He founded the
National
Broadcasting
Company (NBC).
Mid-20th Century
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A great change in household technologies:
the refrigerator,
the freezer,
home oil furnaces,
automatic laundry machine,
vacuum cleaners,
electric dishwashers,
microwave oven,
the electric blender,
the food processor,
and so on…
Late 20th Century
The Age of Visual Information had arrived!
• The invention of television marked the
beginning of “The Age of Visual
Information”, and people were turning into
“couch potatoes”.
Late 20th Century
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Military development:
Radar,
Nuclear energy,
Rocketry,
Atomic bomb,
And so on…
Late 20th Century
• Steve Jobs – invention of personal
computer (PC), founder of the Apple
Company
Late 20th Century
• Bill Gates – invention of a Disc
Operating System (DOS), founder of
Microsoft