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Granville T. Woods, Inventor |
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1856-1910
On the Move with Advanced Trolleys and Safer Trains
In 1903, Granville T. Woods, a famous black American inventor, received a patent for an "Electric Railway (U.S. No. 729,481). Woods held numerous patents relating to the electric railway, electrical devices, brakes, and telegraphy for railways.
Granville Woods was awarded more than 35 patents for electrical system and devices which created new energy techniques for the transportation and communication industries.
Born in Columbus, Ohio, Woods migrated to Missouri and worked in a variety of jobs which gave him the experience to formulate his inventions. In 1884, he secured his first patent for a furnace and boiler to produce steam heat. In the years that followed, the prolific inventor improved the telephone transmitter and developed an electric car powered by overhead wires, a grooved wheel for the trolley car, a "third rail" system for an electric locomotive, an improved airbrake system, and a telegraph system for communicating between moving trains, which contributed to railroad safety. Woods sold most of his inventions to the General Electric, Westinghouse and Bell Telephone Companies.
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