Famous Patents.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume IX, Issue 2890, 4 May 1888, Page 2

Famous Patents.

The stone steps of the gloomy Patent Office in Southampton Buildings are reputed to have been worn hollow by the feet of disappointed inventors; but the prizes which are drawn by the lucky few are nevertheless very tempting. Our contemporary, Invention, states that a particular patented stylographic pen and a pen for shading in different colors are producing £40,000 per annum. Among other examples cited, a rubber tip at the end of lead poncils has yielded the owner over £20,000. The" Drive Well," an idea of the American Colonel Green, whoso troops during the war were in want of water, it is said to yield in royalties, paid mainly by farmers who have adopted it, £600,000 a year. A largo fortune has been reaped by a minji who invented a metal rivet or eyep at eaoh end of the mouth of a coat and trouser pocket, to resist the strain caused by the carriage of pieces of ore and heavy tools. The inventor of the roller skate made over £200,000 by his invention. The gimlet-pointed sorew is believed to have produced more wealth than most mines, and the American who first thought of putting copper tips to children's shoes is " as well off as if his father had left him £400,000 in United States Bonds." Upwards of £2OOO a year is reported to be made by the inventor of the common needle-threader. A favorite American toy has, it is said, yielded the patentee an 'income equal to £IO,OOO a year. Against this may ' bo set the discouraging fact that many of the most useful of inventions—as for example, Mr Fleusa's wonderful apparatus which enables the wearer tw. walk about and breathe freely in tlw foulest of atmospheres—have scarcely paid the cost of patenting,