Apparatus for Handling Brick. (open access)

Apparatus for Handling Brick.

Patent for an apparatus for handling brick "whereby the number of brick handled by a single hand may be greatly increased" (lines 9-11) including illustrations.
Date: January 3, 1888
Creator: Aber, Edgar
System: The Portal to Texas History
Steam-Engine (open access)

Steam-Engine

Patent for a steam engine, improving on the original design so as to "provide a steam-engine having few parts so as to avoid the use of eccentrics, slide-valve, valve-rod, piston and connecting rods, stuffing-boxes, and glands, thus increasing the actual power by decreasing the friction" (lines 26-31).
Date: January 1, 1889
Creator: Harpst, Edgar S.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Radial Tube Boiler. (open access)

Radial Tube Boiler.

Patent for a new and improved boiler. This design "consist[s] of a horizontal steam reservoir, a vertical cylinder provided with radial tubes suspended therefrom and forming a steam-generating chamber, all supported by standards placed underneath said horizontal steam-reservoir and outside of the casing surrounding said steam-generating chamber, and the fire-box placed under said steam-generating chamber" (lines 67-75).
Date: January 22, 1889
Creator: Clarke, John & Savage, Robert W.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Device For Converting Motion. (open access)

Device For Converting Motion.

Patent for a device that converts "regular rotary motion into irregular reciprocating motion" (lines 15-16) which includes instructions and illustrations.
Date: January 26, 1886
Creator: Shellenberger, Samuel L.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Locomotive Valve-Gear. (open access)

Locomotive Valve-Gear.

Patent for improvement to the locomotive valve-gear by utilizing a centrally-pivoted lever.
Date: January 11, 1887
Creator: Lewis, Wallace James
System: The Portal to Texas History
Baling Press. (open access)

Baling Press.

Patent for a new and improved baling-press. This design consists in "the ordinary framing, shell, or case for containing the material and stationary lower platen or bed are used, the upper platen being the movable one to effect the compression. This upper platen is brought down upon the material for its compression by the lowering of screw-threaded rods to which it is attached, such lowering being effected by the rotation of rotating nuts in fixed bearings taking on such screw-threaded rods" (lines 25-35).
Date: January 25, 1887
Creator: Brown, Maurice T.
System: The Portal to Texas History