Have you ever eaten a potato chip?
Have you ever stopped at a stop light?
Ever wear a pair of shoes?
Have you or anyone you've known had open heart surgery?
Ever ride on a train?
George Crum
A chef at the Cary Moon’s Lake House in Lake Saratoga, New York Mr. Crum was annoyed at a customer who complained that his French Fries were too thick. Crum sliced some potato's real thin, fried them and added salt. His attempt at what I'd have to call cooking sarcasm ended up being a huge hit. The potato chip was born in 1853.
Garrett Morgan
One day he witnessed a traffic accident when an automobile collided with a horse and carriage. The driver of the automobile was knocked unconscious and the horse had to be destroyed. He set out to develop a means of automatically directing traffic without the need of a policeman or worker present. In 1923 he patented an automatic traffic signal which he said could be “operated for directing the flow of traffic” and providing a clear and unambiguous “visible indicator.”
Satisfied with his efforts, Morgan sold the rights to his device to the General Electric Company for the astounding sum of $40,000.00 and it became the standard across the country. Today’s modern traffic lights are based upon Morgan’s original design.
Oh, and Morgan also invented the gas mask.
Jan Matzeliger
Mr. Matzeliger invented the machine that sews the top of a shoe to the sole. The process is called "lasting" and was previously done by hand. A good Laster could sew 50 shoes together a day. Matzeliger's machine was able to sew 700 a day. This brought the price of shoes down to a level that everyone could afford them. Mr. Matzeliger was issued a patent for his "Lasting Machine" in 1883.
Daniel Hale Williams
On July 9, 1893, a young man named James Cornish was injured in a bar fight, stabbed in the chest with a knife. By the time he was transported to Provident Hospital he was seeking closer and closer to death, having lost a great deal of blood and having gone into shock. Williams was faced with the choice of opening the man’s chest and possibly operating internally when that was almost unheard of in that day in age. Internal operations were unheard of because any entrance into the chest or abdomen of a patient would almost surely bring with it resulting infection and therefore death. Williams made the decision to operate and opened the man’s chest. He saw the damage to the man’s pericardium (sac surrounding the heart) and sutured it, then applied antiseptic procedures before closing his chest. Fifty one days later, James Cornish walked out of Provident Hospital completely recovered and would go on to live for another fifty years.
Williams is known as the first person to perform an open heart surgery, it is actually more noteworthy that he was the first surgeon to open the chest cavity successfully without the patient dying of infection. His procedures would therefore be used as standards for future internal surgeries.
Andrew Beard
During manual coupling, a worker would have to attempt to precisely time the moment when two railroad cars being pushed together would be close enough for that worker to drop a metal pin between their connectors, thus engaging the cars. If the worker was off by one second he might severe damage his arm or leg – many in fact had to undergo amputation.
On November 27, 1897 Beard received a patent for a device he called the Jenny Coupler. Andrew Beard’s Jenny Coupler. The Jenny Coupler automatically joined cars by simply allowing them to bump into each other, or as Beard described it the “horizontal jaws engage each other to connect the cars.” Beard sold the rights to his invention for $50,000.00 and the railroad industry was revolutionized.
You can read more about these great inventors and learn about other inventors that have impacted our daily lives in a positive way at:
The Black Inventor Online Museum.
Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world. --- Harriet Tubman
Mojo Friday Guidelines
Disclaimer; Kinda like the Pirates Code, they're just guidelines, meant for fun. They aren't hard and fast rules.
1) If you comment you have to recommend all comments. (in order to receive mojo you have to give mojo. It's only good mojo manners.)
2) Everything you say may be taken as a joke (so if you ask a question, expect a silly answer)
3) You must recommend the diary (and pimp it unapologetically)
4) You don't have to comment to recommend.
5) You can't steal my idea (right, like that ain't goin' to happen. It has in numerous forms, I'm flattered!)
6) Mojo mojo mojo mojo, mojo mojo mojo.
7) TexDem (that's me) is not bound by the guidelines. Neither are you
Mojo Friday Goals
Disclaimer; These are mostly here for nostalgia, the site has changed so much and the servers have been upgraded to the point I don't think we could fuck with the site with 1000 people participating. 2007 it ain't.
A. At least 300 different commenters and 1000 comments by 1:30 PM EST and 1500 by 5:00 PM EST Friday Night that it's posted.
B. 100 recommends for each comment, at least.
C. Stay on Recommend List at least five hours (this requires some strategic planning by you guys, refer to guideline #3)
D. At least 200 diary recommends. 300 would be better, spread the word.
E. And always, fun fun fun.
F. Have at least 75% average participation rate as seen here in the Mojo Friday Postgame Show by Woodtick and bjedward.
G. (New) Have at least 30 kossacks over 90% participation (see here for some tips).
H. Overload the servers with recommends, not to mention dominate Top Comments Mojo list. (we do tend to mess with the site with all of our recommends at one time)(also, to dominate the Top Comments Top Mojo we need at least 50 comments with over 200 recommends, see guideline B)
I. That's enough for now. (Have a suggestion? Post it.)
MKinTN posted a diary to help everyone achieve greater success called How to Succeed at Mojo Friday Without Really Trying.
For those of you new to MF (Mojo Friday) we have our own lingo about a few things. Thank's to MF'er Jez (the link will explain) go to this diary for a little more fun and explanation. Official Mojo Friday Snecktionary.