Victor Hasselblad (8 March 1906 – 5 August 1978) was a Swedish inventor and photographer, known for inventing the Hasselblad 6×6 cm medium format camera. Life and work Hasselblad was born in Gothenburg. In 1940 Swedish Air Force officers requested Hasselblad to construct a camera that rivalled the one found in a German reconnaissance aircraft shot down over Sweden. Hasselblad founded the Victor…
68 years ago, today one of the most influential children and adult toys was patented. On the 28th of January 1958 the Lego company patented the design of its Lego bricks, that are still compatible with all their bricks that are produced today. The name Lego is derived from the Danish phrase „leg godt“…
As a photographer this day is a very special to me. Without this day there would have been no photography. On the 9th of January 1839 the French Academy of Sciences announces the Daguerreotype photography process. This marked the birth of photography we know today. To mark this special day I chose a poster…
Isaac Asimov (January 2, 1920 – April 6, 1992) was an American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University. During his lifetime, Asimov was considered one of the “Big Three” science fiction writers, along with Robert A. Heinlein and Arthur C. Clarke. A prolific writer, he wrote or edited more than 500 books. He also wrote an estimated 90,000 letters and postcards.[d] Best known for…
Guinness is a stout that originated in the brewery of Arthur Guinness at St. James’s Gate, Dublin, Ireland, in the 18th century. It is now owned by the British multinational alcoholic beverage maker Diageo. It is one of the most successful alcohol brands worldwide, brewed in almost 50 countries, and available in over 120. Sales in 2011 amounted to 850,000,000 litres (190,000,000 imp gal; 220,000,000 U.S. gal).…
Joseph Rudyard Kipling (30 December 1865 – 18 January 1936) was an English journalist, novelist, poet and short-story writer. He was born in British India, which inspired much of his work. Kipling’s works of fiction include the Jungle Book duology (The Jungle Book, 1894; The Second Jungle Book, 1895), Kim (1901), the Just So Stories (1902) and many short stories, including “The Man Who…
Sir Arthur Charles Clarke CBE FRAS (16 December 1917 – 19 March 2008) was an English science fiction writer, science writer, futurist, inventor, undersea explorer, and television series host. Clarke was a science fiction writer, an avid populariser of space travel, and a futurist of distinguished ability. He wrote many books and many essays for popular magazines. In 1961, he received…
The flag of Europe or European flag consists of twelve golden stars forming a circle on a blue field. It was designed and adopted in 1955 by the Council of Europe (CoE) as a symbol for the whole of Europe. Since 1985, the flag has also been a symbol of the European Union (EU), whose 27 member states are all also CoE members, although in that year the…
Burger King Corporation is an American fast food chain of hamburger fast food restaurants. Burger king is headquartered in Miami-Dade County, Florida, the company was founded on July 23, 1953, as Insta-Burger King, a Jacksonville, Florida–based restaurant chain. After Insta-Burger King ran into financial difficulties, its two Miami-based franchisees David Edgerton (1927–2018) and James McLamore (1926–1996) purchased the company in 1959.[5] Over the next half-century, the…
Meccano is a British brand of construction set created in 1901 by Frank Hornby in Liverpool, England. The system consists of reusable metal strips, plates, angle girders, wheels, axles and gears, and plastic parts that are connected using nuts and bolts. It enables the building of working models and mechanical devices. In 1913, a very similar construction set was introduced in the United States under the brand name Erector. In 1990, Meccano bought…
Pong is a 1972 sports video game developed and published by Atari, Inc. for arcades. It was created by Allan Alcorn as a training exercise assigned to him by Atari co-founder Nolan Bushnell. Bushnell and Atari co-founder Ted Dabney were so surprised by the quality of Alcorn’s work that they decided to manufacture the game. Bushnell based the game’s concept on an electronic ping-pong game…
A match is a tool for starting a fire. Typically, matches are made of small wooden sticks or stiff paper. One end is coated with a material that can be ignited by friction generated by striking the match against a suitable surface. Wooden matches are packaged in matchboxes, and paper matches are partially cut into rows and stapled into matchbooks. The coated…
Charles Monroe “Sparky” Schulz (November 26, 1922 – February 12, 2000) was an American cartoonist who created the long-running comic strip Peanuts, which features the characters Charlie Brown and Snoopy. Schulz was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and developed an interest in drawing while growing up in Saint Paul. He was conscripted in 1943 and served in the United States Army during the final years…
Windows 1.0 is the first major release of Microsoft Windows, a family of graphical user shells and operating systems for personal computers developed by Microsoft. It was first released to manufacturing in the United States on November 20, 1985, while the European version was released as Windows 1.02 in May 1986. Its development began after Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates saw a demonstration of a similar software suite, Visi On,…
David de Gea (born 7 November 1990) is a Spanish professional footballer who plays as a goalkeeper for Serie A club Fiorentina. Considered one of the best keepers of his generation, he is known for his reflexes and shot-stopping capabilities. His performances subsequently attracted the attention of Manchester United, and De Gea joined the club in 2011 for £18.9 million, a British record for…
James and John Ritty patented the design on November 4, 1879, as “Cash Register and Indicator.” This was not the first cash register on the market, as indicated by the patent, which describes it as “Improvement in cash register and indicator.“ The Rittys opened a small factory in Dayton to manufacture cash registers while still operating…
The concept of using a “ball point” within a writing instrument to apply ink to paper has existed since the late 19th century. In these inventions, the ink was placed in a thin tube whose end was blocked by a tiny ball, held so that it could not slip into the tube or fall…
The Walt Disney Company, commonly referred to as simply Disney, is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was founded on October 16, 1923, as an animation studio by brothers Walt Disney and Roy Oliver Disney as Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio; it…
In 1961, traffic psychologist Karl Peglau suggested to the East German Ministry of Transport that each group of road users should have its own traffic light. He developed special signs for pedestrian traffic lights, depicting a standing or walking pedestrian. The East German pedestrian traffic light signals (“Ampelmännchen”) were introduced in 1969 in East…
Staedtler SE is a German multinational stationery manufacturing company based in Nuremberg. The firm was founded by J.S. Staedtler (1800–1872) in 1835 and produces a large variety of stationery products, such as writing implements (including technical drawing instruments), art materials, and office supplies. Staedtler claims to be the largest European manufacturer of wood-cased pencils,…
Gatorade is an American brand of sports-themed beverage and food products, built around its signature line of sports drinks. The drink is owned and manufactured by PepsiCo and is distributed in over 80 countries. The beverage was developed in 1965 by a team of researchers at the University of Florida led by Robert Cade.…
The Metropolitan Police Service (MPS), commonly known as the Metropolitan Police, and simply known as the Met Police or the “Met”, is the territorial police force responsible for law enforcement and crime prevention within Greater London. In addition, it is responsible for specialised tasks throughout the United Kingdom, such as dealing with counterterrorism throughout…
Linda Hamilton (born September 26, 1956) is an American actress. Known for portraying tough, resilient characters, she made her film debut in 1979 before achieving fame with her starring role as Sarah Connor in The Terminator (1984) and two of its sequels, Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) and Terminator: Dark Fate (2019). She is…
The Cannes Film Festival, until 2003 called the International Film Festival (Festival international du film), is considered the most prestigious film festival in the world. Held in Cannes, France, it previews new films of all genres, including documentaries, from all around the world. Founded in 1946, the invitation-only festival is held annually (usually in…
The Royal Opera House (ROH) is a theatre in Covent Garden, central London. The building is often referred to as simply Covent Garden, after a previous use of the site. The ROH is the main home of The Royal Opera, The Royal Ballet, and the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, which are known…
The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada and the highest…
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world’s largest and highest-energy particle accelerator. It was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) between 1998 and 2008, in collaboration with over 10,000 scientists, and hundreds of universities and laboratories across more than 100 countries. It lies in a tunnel 27 kilometres (17 mi)…
The PlayStation (codenamed PSX, abbreviated as PS, and retroactively PS1 or PS one) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Sony Computer Entertainment. It was released in Japan on 3 December 1994, followed by North America on 9 September 1995, Europe on 29 September 1995, and other regions following thereafter. As…
Pizza was introduced to the United States in the 1890s along with waves of Italian immigrants who settled primarily in the larger cities of the Northeast, such as New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and Baltimore. Pizza and pizzerias rapidly grew in popularity in the late 1940s. During the latter half of the 20th century, pizza…