Inventions of the 19th century Quiz

Answer: Canned food

Although he didn't know why it worked, Appert discovered that food heated and then immediately sealed in jars would stay fresh as long as it wasn't opened. Cans were soon in general use, although they had to be opened with a hammer and chisel as the can-opener wasn't invented until 1855.

Answer: A miner's lamp

Methane gas seeping out of the coal seams used to be ignited by naked flames, causing serious underground explosions and claiming many lives. The miners carried caged canaries in the hope that the birds would detect the gas before it could do any harm, but this was not very successful.

The 'Davy' lamp was designed with metal gauze surrounding the flame, so preventing any escaping gas reaching a combustible temperature.

Answer: Antiseptics

After connecting the deaths of young mothers with examinations by medical students who had just been dissecting corpses, Semmelweis found that by making the students wash their hands in a solution of diluted bleach powder, the death toll fell dramatically.

Some twenty years later an English surgeon, Joseph Lister, started routinely using carbolic to sterilise his hands and equipment before operations.

Answer: A cash register

Whilst travelling to Europe, James Ritty noticed a contraption in the ship's engine room which counted the revolutions of the propeller. As he was losing a lot of money to his dishonest cashiers, he adapted the idea to build himself the 'Incorruptible Cashier'.

Answer: X-rays

Investigating reports that a sort of ray escaped from the bottles when the electrical charge passed through them, Roentgen used the normal symbol employed by scientists when they have no idea what a thing is - 'X'. He soon discovered that using the 'X'rays he could see through solid objects. He was the recipient, in 1901, of the first Nobel Prize for Physics.

Answer: Traffic lights

Based on his railway signals, Knight's traffic lights were controlled by a policeman, whose job it was to pull a lever to raise the semaphore arms during daylight, and at night to revolve either a red or green glass in front of a gas lamp. Three years later, the poor constable on duty was injured when the traffic lights exploded.

Answer: Lie detector

Lombroso used a plethysmograph, a device invented twenty five years earlier for the measurement of blood volume, as he deduced that the stress of telling lies would cause changes in blood flow. Earlier lie detection had relied upon such methods as filling the suspects' mouths with rice, and, on the premise that the guilty would have dry mouths, getting the suspects to spit out the rice. Whoever had a lot of rice left in their mouth was deemed to be the guilty party!

Answer: A jukebox

Despite the fact that it only played one tune, the jukebox (taken from the Creole "jook" for dancing), took more than $1,000 in a six month period.

Answer: Electric chair

In his bid to show that Westinghouse's favoured current AC(alternating current) was too dangerous for general use, and DC(direct current) should be used instead, Edison mounted a campaign in which he subjected stray animals to large voltages to show just how lethal it was, saying that they had been "Westinghoused"! This rather dubious campaign led to the development of the electric chair, said to be a quick and painless way of inflicting the death penalty. Murderer, William Kemmler, the first criminal to "use" it, took fifteen minutes to die.

Answer: Alexander Graham Bell

Unfortunately all Bell managed to detect were the metal bed springs below the President's body. Garfield died and Bell didn't pursue the development of his new device!