1956 gave us some technological discoveries & inventions. We have written a list of the top 5 inventions that were made in the year 1956
Image Source: edubilla.com
Hovercraft
Invented by – Christopher Cockerell
In 1956, British inventor and engineer Christopher Sydney Cockerell designed the hovercraft, a fast water-transport vehicle that was neither a boat nor a plane, but rather a hybrid of sorts. Hovercraft are any of a class of British-built and British-operated air-cushion vehicles (ACVs) that have carried passengers and automobiles across the English Channel between southern England and northern France for the past 40 years. The first in the series, known as SR.N1 (for Saunders-Roe Nautical 1), was designed by English inventor Christopher Cockerell. It was a four-ton vehicle that could only carry three people.
Read More
Image Source: history-computer.com
IBM Hard disk
Invented by – Reynold Johnson
In 1956, Reynold Johnson of IBM discovered the hard disc. RAM allows a user to search and access a certain record or data file in storage very fast – within seconds or even fractions of seconds. Johnson and his colleagues provided IBM management with the first-ever working hard disc in late 1955. The RAMAC (Random Access Method of Accounting Control) was a one-ton machine that met IBM's original standards, with access times to any given file averaging roughly one second. It used fifty 24-inch magnetic discs revolving at 1200 RPM on a single shaft with two read/write heads that could access the files quickly.
Read More
Image Source: dignitymemorial.com
Lint roller
Invented by – Nicholas McKay and Helen
Nicholas McKay, Sr. was a businessman and inventor from the United States. The Lint Pic-Up, the world's first lint roller, was his most well-known (and first commercial) product. Before chaperoning his son's high school dance in 1956, McKay needed masking tape, a paper roll, and some wire to clean his outfit. The following day, he and his late wife Helen founded Helmac. Helmac is a household products company that dominated the American market in 1996, capturing 92 percent of the market.
Read More
Image Source: Wikipedia
Industrial robot
Invented by – George Devol and Joseph F. Engelberger
Joseph F. Engelberger, an American physicist, engineer, and businessman, is credited with founding one of the most important and influential industries, earning him the title of "Father of Robotics" around the world. At a cocktail party in 1956, Engelberger met American engineer and inventor George C. Devol, with whom he discussed the robot theories of writer Isaac Asimov and Devol's patent-pending Programmed Article Transfer system. Engelberger recognised the gadget as the world's first robot and imagined how it may be employed in industry, particularly to undertake tasks that are hazardous to humans.
Read More
Image Source: Wikipedia
Fortran
Invented by – John Backus
One of the first general-purpose, high-level computer programming languages, Fortran, or Formula Translator, was created by John Backus in 1956. This widely used language made computers usable and accessible to scientists and others without necessitating a comprehensive understanding of the technology. He enlisted the help of a group of programmers and mathematicians to create a language and a translator. Backus believed that a translator would be the key to making the computer easier and faster to use. It would do away with the time-consuming and tedious hand-coding that was common in computer programming at the time.
Read More