The Richmond Indiana palladium. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1854-1855, 1855-07-19

Albany Evening Journal
Everybody knows that there are accumula-
ted in the Patent Office, several thousand
miniature models OF all sorts Of patented ma
chimes. But every BODY h"e~ 80 - ~.
III the vaults underneath. there nearly
double the number Of models Of rejected in
ventions. Il is huge mausoleum of departed
ingenuity. Here lie the mortal remains Of
such machines AS persisted in their early infan-
cv. There are little locks and pulley blocks
silk reels and water wheels. power looms and
mill fumes, wind mills and Jones pills, sew
ing machines and moving machines, tanning
machines and tanning machines, shngle split
tiers and stocking kntters, rocking chairs and
winding stairs, cultivstors, dumb waters and
refri.erators. mouse traps and razor strops,
life preserving boats and india rubber over
coats, iron doors and grain sewers, latches and
lucifer matches, gas burners, bedstead turn
ers, spark arresters, liquor testers, black
smiths vices, moulds for water ices, cradles,
ladies, lamps, clamps, nails, pals. scales,
rails. and all sorts Of apparatus for cotton
winding. book binding, stove casting. rock
blasting. cloth stitching. hitching, fax
breaking, grain raking. paper making, and
portrait taking, dc. There over fifteen
thousand of them in all. Odd enough they
look-such maze Of dusty little wheels and
gearing and machinery, and all silent and mo-
tlonless and forgotten. There is something of
the toy shop about it, and something of the
grave ward. But each one was brought here
by some exulting inventor, who foresaw in it
a manifest destiny" and for himself glo-
rious future What seepless nights have been
passed over some of them What a story Of
disappointment must be connected with every
one Of them! How many wasted days and
unfulflied hopes lie buried il those vaults
IL. l., ID 4
Bulwer saw in dream library composed
Of the great books that had never been writ
ten, but that was nothing compared with this
grand repository of machines that never were
invented.
Tie use Of keeping Mcm--What is the use
OF keeping them? i is intended w hen I'm
Gle sam gets rich, to bring them all up stairs,
build cases and shelves for them, and arrar sc
= -. sHstnnaaii /, Than sHi.an man
comes to the office with 3 repetition of some
old invention, they will say to him. ''Sir, your
model is not patentabe. 1t is not new. You
will find one on exactly the same principle,
in case b. on the sixth shelf, deposited by
Peter Stokes, in 1913" The disappointed
applicant goes 10 case B. reconnoitres shelf
No. 6, beholds the Stokesisn failure-and de-
parts, feeling with solomon, that there is in
deed nothing new under the sun
Your inventor is man of high hopes and
unbounded expectations. 1t is doubtful
whether anything ever was patented vet that
its owner did net believe 10 be worth quar-
ter of million. Offer him thousand dol
lars to stay at home, when he is about starting
for Washington, and see if he viii take t.
Not he He looks farther--the gift of second
sight is upon him. Visions of bank notes,
contracts and licenses, float before his mental
eye-vsions of stately mansion and equi-
page, and whole street of busy, rattiug.
smoking factories. employing hundreds of
hands, and turning out. annually, dozens and
hundreds of the great Patent Self-Actin..
Compound, Steam ASKING Machines. So
sure is he of its novelty, that he makes no
he meets. So generous is he. in the flush of
triumph. that he is ready to take You into
partnership. this minute
1t is not easy for him to give up his dreams.
1t is hard for him to believe that the work he
has been months or years celebrating has been
done before, and done better. By somebody
else. When the examiners tell him 50, he
does not believe them. When they argue
with him, he sets them down as prejudicial--,
bribed, may be. The Commissioner himself
cannot convince him,
Or, if convinced yainst his will.
Hes Of the opinion still.
NotDln8 out cCCulaT uefuouStTaION Will sat
isfy him Of the fact. aud il is to supply that
that these models are treasured
up against his coming. No man knows. until
he has tried it. what ill omcned shapes" Turk
Hon Inrerfoas ani R Il s1zs are alike
like misfortunes. seldom come
single. They are in pairs, or threes. or doz- !
ems. 1t is true of great ones, especially
Half-a- dozen nations have disputed for centu-
ries who worked the first printing press. and .
the dispute is not settled yet Halfa dozen I
claim the honor Of having ushered into the +
world the first electric machine. The origin +
Of the steam engine Is still shrouded in mist
Who can say with any certainty which of the
rival claimants first put railroad car on
wheels! What man can affirm at this dav
without fear OF contradiction By the next man.
that so and 50 discovered the magnetic tele
graph Weeven remember TO have once heard
a lecture TO prove that ii Columbus had not
discovered America hen he did somebody
else would have discovered it IN a year or
two.
When Commerce. or Art meets an obstacle.
various persons in different parts OF the world .
set about studying how 10 get over it. Ii is
not surprising. perhaps, that two or more of
them often hit upon the same process about
the same time. Yet they need not II everv
man who thinks he is producing whs; has no.
been invented, should first visit the Patent
Office TO see what has been invented in two
cases out of three, he would save himself
time. money. and Improbable labor, and have
no cause to gradge his journey.
1T The yellow Fever has made its appear
snce IN New Orleans. Twenty cases. some
Of which proved fatel have been reported.
correspondent of the n Y. Tribune saws