Harvey Hubbell
Harvey Hubbell II | |
|---|---|
 Harvey Hubbell II | |
| Born | Dec 20, 1857 Brooklyn, Kings County, New York |
| Died | December 17, 1927 (aged 70) |
| Nationality | American |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Electrical engineering |
| Institutions | Harvey Hubbell, Incorporated |
Harvey Hubbell II (December 20, 1857 - December 17, 1927), was an American inventor, entrepreneur, and industrialist. His best-known inventions are the U.S. electrical plug[1] and the pull-chain light socket.[2]
In 1888, at the age of thirty-one, Hubbell quit his job as a manager of a manufacturing company and founded Hubbell Incorporated in Bridgeport, Connecticut, a company which is still in business today, still headquartered near Bridgeport. Hubbell began manufacturing consumer products and, by necessity, inventing manufacturing equipment for his factory. Some of the equipment he designed included automatic tapping machines and progressive dies for blanking and stamping. One of his most important industrial inventions, still in use today, is the thread rolling machine. He quickly began selling his newly devised manufacturing equipment alongside his commercial products.
Hubbell received at least 45 patents,[3] most of which were for electric products. The pull-chain electrical light socket was patented in 1896, and his most famous invention, the U.S. electrical power plug, in 1904. It allowed the adoption in the U.S. of convenient, portable electrical devices, which Great Britain had enjoyed since the early 1880s.[4] In 1916, Hubbell was also granted a patent for a three-bladed power plug, including an earth pin, which Australian regulators and electrical accessory manufacturers adopted as the standard for that country in the 1930s. It was also adopted in New Zealand, Argentina, and (with a minor variation) in China.[5]
See also
- History_of_AC_power_plugs_and_sockets#Hubbell's_inventions, details, and images
References
- ^ U.S. Patent #774,250, Separable Attachment Plug
- ^ U.S. Patent #565,541, Socket for Incandescent Lamps
- ^ "Hubbell Sockets". Antique Light Sockets. Retrieved 2010-07-10.
Between 1896 and 1909 he was granted 45 patents on a wide variety of electrical products.
- ^ John Mellanby, "The History of Electric Wiring" (1957), p165, London: Macdonald.
- ^ "Power plug & outlet Type I". World Standards. Retrieved 2017-10-10.
External links
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- 1857 births
- 1927 deaths
- 19th-century American inventors
- 20th-century American inventors
- American electrical engineers
- Businesspeople from Bridgeport, Connecticut
- Engineers from Connecticut