Language

Adding-Machine. (open access)

Adding-Machine.

Patent for an inexpensive, simple, easily operated, and improved registering machine that is meant to add numbers without mistakes. It uses revoluble number wheels and a spring-returned shaft among other materials.
Date: March 21, 1893
Creator: Brooks, Augustus J.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Adjustable Standard for Plows. (open access)

Adjustable Standard for Plows.

Patent for improvements to foot pieces that allow for easy adjustment of plowing depth. Includes instructions and illustrations.
Date: July 1, 1891
Creator: Teague, Jasper K.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Advertising Device. (open access)

Advertising Device.

Patent for "a simple and inexpensive advertising device adapted to be placed on street corners and other public places and capable of exciting the curiosity and attracting attention, and thereby directing the attention of persons to the advertisement" (lines 11-16).
Date: March 20, 1894
Creator: Attaway, Henry F.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Agricultural Implement. (open access)

Agricultural Implement.

Patent for a new and improved sweep. This design consists "in a sweep of a suitable shape and construction having attached to each of its rear corners a vertical bar or wings, which extends parallel to the course of the plow and backward a suitable distance beyond the sweep proper . . . The object of [the] invention is to attach to the rear corners or wings of a sweep bars or runners, which rest upon the ground and steady the sweep and prevent it from wabbling or dodging while in use" (lines 14-25).
Date: March 4, 1890
Creator: Cameron, Hugh L.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Agricultural Implement. (open access)

Agricultural Implement.

Patent for "agricultural implements to be used for tilling the soil and planting, either separately or at one and the same operation, and has for its object to reduce the expense incurred by the general practice of first preparing the land for planting and subsequently sowing the seed. By this inventions the land can simultaneously prepared and the grain deposited therein." (Lines 8-17) Includes instructions and illustrations.
Date: March 2, 1897
Creator: Dycus, George W.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Anal Speculum. (open access)

Anal Speculum.

Patent for a new and improved anal speculum. This design is "to so construct the several parts that there will be no rough or raised edges to interfere with its insertion in the anal passage; secondly, to so construct [the] improved speculum that it may be readily used as a bi-valve or dilator; thirdly, to form a locking-joint on the meeting edges of the shells forming the speculum, whereby the sections are prevented from overlapping each other to avoid pinching or injury to the walls of the anal passage while the instrument is being inserted; fourthly, to provide a plug for [the] improved speculum" (lines 17-29).
Date: March 25, 1890
Creator: Shuford, Quincy Adams
System: The Portal to Texas History
Angle-Cock. (open access)

Angle-Cock.

Patent for "a locking device for the train pipe valve or plug, and a connection separate from the train pipe and under the control of the engineer, to manipulate the said locking device and secure the valve or plug in position." (Lines 13-18) Includes instructions and illustrations.
Date: March 19, 1895
Creator: Waldron, William J.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Animal-Trap. (open access)

Animal-Trap.

Patent for an improved animal trap for “catching small animals in a trap which will be ever set and in operative position for catching an animal and which will be automatically reset” (lines 10-13), illustration is included.
Date: March 17, 1891
Creator: Bassinger, Stephen
System: The Portal to Texas History
Apparatus for Aging Whisky. (open access)

Apparatus for Aging Whisky.

Patent for a barrel for heating and aging whiskey, which accelerates aging time. Includes instructions and illustrations.
Date: June 15, 1891
Creator: Halligan, John H.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Apparatus for Burning Garbage. (open access)

Apparatus for Burning Garbage.

Patent for an apparatus for burning garbage that is made up of a roasting chamber, a grate to hold the garbage, two furnaces, a passage for the ashes, a third furnace connected to the passage, flues, a smokestack, non-combustible absorbent material around the flues and beneath the grate, and flues beneath the grate.
Date: March 27, 1894
Creator: Risley, Ward
System: The Portal to Texas History
Apparatus for Condensing Flue-Dust. (open access)

Apparatus for Condensing Flue-Dust.

Patent for an apparatus for "condensing and saving the flue-dust passing with the waste gases through the chimney of lead-smelting furnaces." (Lines 9-12) Includes instructions and illustrations.
Date: July 3, 1889
Creator: Hizon, Hiram W.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Apparatus for Elevating and Cleaning Seed-Cotton. (open access)

Apparatus for Elevating and Cleaning Seed-Cotton.

Patent for a steam-powered device for cleaning seed-cotton. Includes instructions and illustrations.
Date: October 10, 1891
Creator: Robinson, Albert S.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Apparatus for Handling Lint-Cotton. (open access)

Apparatus for Handling Lint-Cotton.

Patent for an apparatus for handling lint-cotton that allows air to move freely without back pressure while putting the fiber into a bat. It has a "trunk into which a series of gins deliver, of a primary condenser having a high surface speed, so that it will rapidly remove the fiber and prevent the bat from building up of such thickness as to check the escape of air, and a second condenser having a slower surface speed and arranged to receive the lint from the first condenser and form it into a thicker bat" (lines 29-37).
Date: March 19, 1895
Creator: Campbell, Douglas M.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Apparatus for Scouring Water-Ways. (open access)

Apparatus for Scouring Water-Ways.

Patent for an improved apparatus for scouring water-ways by using water-discharge pipes and air-discharge pipes arranged at each side of the vessel. When “vessel is slowly moved forward while the water and air forcing pumps are working,..... direct force of the water-jets and air-jets will agitate and scatter and lift the dislodged particles and float them much higher and longer than would be the case were the water-jet pipes alone used.” (Lines 63-75) Illustration is included.
Date: March 31, 1891
Creator: Holden, Elbridge G.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Apparatus for Washing and Scrubbing Gas. (open access)

Apparatus for Washing and Scrubbing Gas.

Patent for a washer-scrubber that cleans gas from "tarry matter, ammonia, sulphureted hydrogen, carbonic acid and other impurities" (lines 14-16). The machine divides gas into streams, sprays it with washing liquor, spreads it over reticulated and perforated plates.
Date: March 7, 1893
Creator: Fitzgerald, John H.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Arm for Telegraph - Poles. (open access)

Arm for Telegraph - Poles.

Patent for a new and useful arm for telegraph poles.
Date: March 8, 1898
Creator: Anderson, Lee
System: The Portal to Texas History
Artificial Stone. (open access)

Artificial Stone.

Patent for artificial stone made of a special combination of cement that hardens and stays hard under water. It also does not conduct heat.
Date: March 19, 1895
Creator: Power, John H. & Power, Rufus M.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Automatic Car-Switching System. (open access)

Automatic Car-Switching System.

Patent for "a system of switching where the cars of a train are pushed up an incline and placed successively on an elevated annular revolving platform, by which they are automatically distributed to their respective receiving-tracks" (lines 9-14).
Date: March 24, 1896
Creator: Lelardoux, Pierre
System: The Portal to Texas History
Automatic Cotton or Corn Planter. (open access)

Automatic Cotton or Corn Planter.

Patent for an automatic cotton or corn planter that is simple and inexpensive, and is a line of planters that sows in parallel rows that does not need to be guided by hand. The devices are independently adjustable.
Date: March 13, 1894
Creator: Nehrmeyer, Henry
System: The Portal to Texas History
Automatic Cut-off for Rotary Engines (open access)

Automatic Cut-off for Rotary Engines

Patent for improvements "to the means for actuating the valves controlling the steam supply" (lines 10-12).
Date: March 6, 1890
Creator: Wallerich, Nicholas
System: The Portal to Texas History
Axle. (open access)

Axle.

Patent for improvement in axles by using a “combination of a bar, two skeins and means for holding the skeins in place upon the bar,” (lines 17-18) includes illustration.
Date: March 31, 1891
Creator: Stewart, John A.
System: The Portal to Texas History
Baling-Press. (open access)

Baling-Press.

Patent for an improvement to machinery to wind fibrous materials (e.g., cotton) into cylindrical bales that does not use a core or fixed horizontal rollers.
Date: March 30, 1897
Creator: Ross, William Andrew
System: The Portal to Texas History
Baling Press. (open access)

Baling Press.

Patent for a new and improved baling press. This design is "to place two baling-chambers at a suitable angle to each other and to connect both of the followers to the same sweep; to attach each of the filling-doors of the baling-chambers to the sweep, so that when one door closes from its own weight the other will be opened by the movement of the sweep, and to provide each of the filling doors with an automatically-acting bolt mechanism, whereby the movement of the follower bolts the door, so that it cannot be opened upward by the pressure of hay that is being pressed" (lines 15-26).
Date: March 4, 1890
Creator: Spencer, Anderson Hood
System: The Portal to Texas History
Baling-Press. (open access)

Baling-Press.

Patent for improvements to a press that bales hay. Includes instructions and illustrations.
Date: April 15, 1891
Creator: Mattijetz, Andreas
System: The Portal to Texas History