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Some more tidbits from the PatentStorm website, along with some observations of my own. What a strange, interesting morning this was.

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Today in history: John H. Kraft granted a patent for the "manufacture of soft surface cured cheese".

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson Sr., chairman of IBM ; 1943

"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."
Ken Olsen, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corporation ; 1977

[An inclining coffin?! Creepy!]

"It is my heart-warmed and world-embracing Christmas hope and aspiration that all of us, the high, the low, the rich, the poor, the admired, the despised, the loved, the hated, the civilized, the savage (every man and brother of us all throughout the whole earth), may eventually be gathered together in a heaven of everlasting rest and peace and bliss, except the inventor of the telephone."

Mark Twain, Christmas greetings, 1890

[I was not previously aware that someone actually patented the side-to-side swinging method. You know, the one you did when you were little to crash into each other. Imagine the patent infringement on that one!]

"What, sir, would you make a ship sail against the wind and currents by lighting a bonfire under her deck? I pray you, excuse me; I have not the time to listen to such nonsense."

Napoleon Bonaparte, when told of the Robert Fulton steamboat

DYK ... that the inventor of the electric motor was a blacksmith named Thomas Davenport? Described as "a brilliantly unsuccessful inventor", Davenport invented the first rotary electric motor. In 1836 he headed out -- on foot -- from his Vermont home to file a patent application at the Patent Office in Washington, D.C. By the time he got there, he had squandered away his money and couldn't afford the $30 filing fee so he turned around and went home. When he later mailed in his application with money he'd raised, the Patent office was destroyed in a fire. He did finally get credit for his invention on Feb. 5, 1837.

Actor Zeppo Marx patented a "Cardiac Pulse Rate Monitor" in 1969.

...that Thomas Edison's patent application on his phonograph was approved by the Patent Office in just seven weeks? In contrast, it took Gordon Gould, the inventor of the laser, 30 years to obtain his patent -- finally awarded in 1988!

"The idea that cavalry will be replaced by these iron coaches is absurd. It is little short of treasonous."
Aide-de-camp to Field Marshal Haig at a tank demonstration, 1916

[Ha ha ha ha! Armor with rollers!]

"Without question, the greatest invention in the history of mankind is beer. Oh, I grant you that the wheel was also a fine invention, but the wheel does not go nearly as well with pizza."

Dave Barry

"Transmission of documents via telephone wires is possible in principle, but the apparatus required is so expensive that it will never become a practical proposition."

Dennis Gabor, British physicist

[An optoelectronic cloaking device. Which means that they weren’t making it up for James Bond!]

DYK ... Chester Carlson was a patent agent who tired of having to make multiple copies of patent applications using the only duplication method available at the time: carbon paper. In 1959 he came up with a new copying system and took it to IBM for evaluation. The "experts" at IBM determined potential sales to be only 5,000 units because people wouldn't want to use a bulky machine when they had carbon paper. Carlson's invention was the xerography process, the company founded on the system is Xerox.

"For a list of all the ways technology has failed to improve the quality of life, please press three."
Alice Kahn

"The horse is here to stay, the automobile is only a fad."
President of Michigan Savings Bank; 1903

Superstar singer Michael Jackson co-patented a "Method and means for creating anti-gravity illusion" in 1993.

3M employee and church chorister Art Fry needed something to temporarily mark pages in his hymnal. He was in luck because his colleague, Spencer Silver, accidentally developed a glue that was too weak for other purposes. After initially discouraging consumer response, Post-it Notes became a hit in 1979.

"Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?"
Harry Warner, Warner Brothers ; 1927

"Man will not fly for 50 years."
Wilbur Wright ; 1901

"The production of too many useful things results in too many useless people."
Karl Marx [Hmm.]

"I watched his countenance closely, to see if he was not deranged ... and I was assured by other senators after he left the room that they had no confidence in it."

U.S. Senator Smith of Indiana, after witnessing a demonstration of Samuel Morse’s telegraph, 1842

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Okay! That’s more than enough. Broke up the monotony of the patent forms nicely, though. Have a good day, folks.