Through patenting, American inventors contributed to the development of practically any consumer product you can imagine. Hagley’s collection of over 5,000 patent models reflects that.
With the onset of the Industrial Revolution, Americans had more money to spend on those products and more time to amuse themselves. This extended to children which led to an explosion of patents involving toys, games, and countless other gizmos to keep them entertained.
By the mid-nineteenth century, Americans' growing consumer culture was primed to embrace a new holiday: Christmas! With the holiday season approaching, let’s have a look at a few toy patents that can be viewed over the holidays in Hagley’s patent model exhibit, Nation of Inventors.
Archelaus Condell moved from Canada to the United States around 1865. Four years later, at age 17, he earned his first patent for this toy carriage. The two monkey figures at the top of the toy jumped up and down as the wheel was pushed across the floor providing “amusement” and “stimulus” for the child. He patented this toy with his father, John Condell.
The Civil War ended shortly before the Condell family came to the United States. Tens of thousands of soldiers survived amputations during the war. There was a great demand, and juicy government contracts, for artificial limbs that were inexpensive to manufacture, adjustable, durable, and easy to repair. John and Archelaus founded John Condell & Son in New York City which became a very successful business manufacturing these limbs. John earned three patents and Hagley owns two of his patent models for artificial legs. One model is on view on the second floor of Nation of Inventors.
Jesse Armour Crandall’s invention replaced the usual skipping rope with metal hoops. The child, like this doll seen wearing the invention in the photo above, wore a belt around their waist with two hand cranks attached for spinning the hoops overhead and underfoot. He claimed that “this instrument, when properly handled, will afford much amusement to children and give occasion for graceful movements.”
Crandall earned over 100 patents—mostly for toys. The son of a toy and baby carriage manufacturer, he began carving toy figures at age 8 and began working in his father’s factory around age 11. He was awarded his first patent for a hobby horse in his twenties. He operated a very successful combination toy manufactory and retail store at corner of Fulton and Pierrepont Streets in Brooklyn, NY that supplied toys to Presidents and even British Royalty. In his old age, neighborhood children called him “Grandpop” and would bring him their broken toys for repair. When he died in 1920, The Knoxville Sentinel ran the headline “'Santa Claus’ Dead."
Come see these, and many more models, in Nation of Inventors when you visit Hagley this holiday season!
Chris Cascio is the Alan W. Rothschild Assistant Curator, Patent Models at Hagley Museum and Library