This country has long been known for ingenuity — our ability to imagine, to dream, and to put those dreams into action. It’s the intrepid, pioneering spirit that enabled us to put a man on the moon, to build architectural marvels like the Empire State Building, and to accomplish remarkable medical and technological breakthroughs from heart transplants to the Internet. By God, it’s what brought us the spork! Now, “ingenuity” and “banking town” aren’t two things you’d normally expect to see in the same sentence, but we’ve found some area folks, ranging from genius to, well, curious, in whom a creative and resourceful spirit is alive and well. These Charlotteans either have patents pending or patents recently approved on their own unique inventions. Who knows, one day when you’re tightening the toilet seat, eating a fruit cup, brushing your teeth, or using the earth’s gravitational field to get in shape, you might look back on this article and remember that you heard about these world-changing inventions first, right here in these pages.
Candy Magnifying Glass
Ever since he was a kid, Ethan Summers made his own toys. Naturally creative and artistic, he eventually became a freelance illustrator for Milton Bradley and Parker Brothers, designing game covers and the like. He also continued to design toys, mostly as a hobby. But then he and his wife started seeing some of his toy designs for sale on store shelves.
“I thought, hmm, maybe I should get into this for a living,” Summers says. So he did. Working out of his home studio, Summers, in what has to be one of the coolest jobs around, designs numerous toys and “candy novelty items,” including his newest invention, the edible “candy magnifier.”
“I was just messing around with a magnifying glass one day and happened to have a lollipop and realized they’re kind of shaped the same, and I got to wondering if you could actually use candy syrup to magnify and refract light the same way a magnifying glass does. It turns out you can.”
Summers’ “Lookn-Lick” magnifying lollipop has a plastic handle and a green magnifying “lens” that is edible and does indeed magnify images. The plastic handle is also filled with little pieces of candy.
Summers recently returned from California where, it turns out, another company has released its own versions of a candy magnifier.
“As soon as my patent issues, they will be in violation,” says Summers. “But they’re good folks and we’re getting all of it squared away. If my patent is approved, I’ll just get royalties from them. This industry is very cannibalistic and people will knock you off in a second. I’m actually a little hesitant about putting the candy magnifier out there except for the fact that word’s already gotten out.”
Summers’ other candy novelty inventions include “Sucker Punch,” a boxing glove sucker on the end of an extendable handle, and “Secret Spy Notes,” a little spy suitcase which contains bubble gum, four top-secret envelopes, and a pen with edible ink. “You can write on the gum, put it in the top secret envelopes, pass it along to your friends, and they can eat the top secret message.” This writer’s personal favorite is the “Toot Fruit,” a little green monster with a strained expression on its face that’s filled with chewable pieces of candy. Squeeze the monster’s accordion-like lower body and farting sounds erupt from its head. Edison, eat your heart out.
Toilet Tool
As happens to so many of us, inspiration struck David Kish while he was sitting on the john. Moreover, his light bulb moment was actually about the toilet (which, by the way, was invented by a man named J.F Brondel in 1738, and not some guy named Crapper as popular myth has it). Kish, at 69, had seen his fair share of toilets, and knew that they often fell prey to normal wear and tear.
“I’ve owned several homes, and one thing you notice while raising a family is that toilet seats get loose and flush levers didn’t work much of the time,” Kish says.
Frustrated by this ongoing plumbing problem, Kish decided to do something about it. After tinkering around for awhile, he devised a tool that had a screwdriver on one end and a wrench on the other — perfectly designed to tighten a toilet’s flush lever and seat. Kind of like an all-purpose Boy Scout knife. Except for the toilet. And even better, the single piece, combination tool is made of strong composite materials so it can be stored in the toilet’s water tank without rusting.
“If the seat or flush lever is loose, you just pick up the lid, get the tool, tighten everything up, and put it back in the toilet.”
After Kish made his handy dandy toilet tool, he bought a book on patent law, and soon realized it was a cumbersome and expensive process. “Of course they (US Patent Office) like to reject everything at first — it’s not easy, they’ve made it very complicated, but I’ll weather the storm.”
While waiting them out, Kish has sent his device to Lowe’s, Home Depot, and True Value Hardware. So far he hasn’t had any takers.
Kish, who has lived in Charlotte for over 20 years and recently retired from the Public Library, says he’s always been the creative type. In fact, the toilet tool isn’t his first invention. Years ago he came up with a new design for a kitty litter box, but before he could get it completed, someone else had it on the market.
“That’s alright,” he says. “It keeps my mind active.”
Smoke (One) If You Got ‘Em
According to The Center for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 400,000 Americans die from cigarette smoking each year; Kenan Porobic hopes to change that disturbing statistic with his invention. It doesn’t aim to stop people from smoking, but rather limit the number of cigarettes they smoke. How? Why, by following safety instructions printed on each cigarette pack: Do not smoke more than two cigarettes per day. Excessive smoking will seriously harm our health.
What gave him such an idea?
“A headache,” he says. “I was reading the directions on a bottle of Tylenol, and it said only take two at a time and no more than eight a day. I thought it was very interesting that the company actually tries to limit its sales. Imagine if tobacco companies did this?”
Porobic, who moved to Charlotte from Bosnia in 1995 and now works as a civil engineer for a construction company, figured that if smokers only indulged in two cigarettes per day, that would drastically reduce the number of smoking-related deaths.
“If my patent is implemented, and it changes the behavior of just 10 percent of smokers, that means thousands of lives can be saved,” he says. “My patent would shift the responsibility from society and tobacco manufacturers to the individual. Once you print the safety instructions, it’s the smoker’s responsibility to follow them, and if they choose not to, and smoke 40 cigarettes a day and get cancer, it’s their fault.”
After Porobic applied for a patent in 2002, he contacted the Center for Disease Control and The New England Journal of Medicine and asked if they could provide any information that would disprove his one-cigarette-a-day claim. He says he was given the brush-off: “In my mind it’s obstruction. Either prove me wrong, or support me, but don’t be indifferent.”
Frustrated by the lack of response, Porobic — who, oddly enough, says he’s never had any friends or family suffer from the ill effects of smoking — then contacted Philip Morris, hoping to strike a deal. “I said let’s sign a contract — if you implement my idea I’ll improve your business. But they said it was their practice not to discuss any ideas unless patent rights are issued, even though I’m talking about millions of lives that could be saved.
“My idea should be covered by business, by federal law, and science — and all of them have failed,” he continued. “I knocked on many, many doors, and nobody dared to touch it, everybody is so scared. It is very disappointing.”
The BC Cruncher
Rae Crowther started his football career in the 1920s, playing with the Frankford Yellow Jackets, which eventually became the Philadelphia Eagles. Later, he became a successful coach at the University of Pennsylvania, where Crowther realized that some kind of apparatus was needed to help players practice their hits and moves without getting injured. Crowther approached manufacturer Al Steward, and together the two men helped start the football sled industry. Today, the sled, a common piece of training equipment typically constructed of concave pads attached to a frame, is used by coaches to teach basic blocking and tackling techniques.
Some 70 years after this bit of gridiron inspiration, Harry Krause, Al Steward’s great grandson, continues the family tradition as an employee of Rae Crowther, now a company in Rock Hill. Their most recent innovation is the “BC Cruncher.” (In addition to his great grandfather, Krause’s grandfather, father and uncle have all made football equipment.)
“In football, there really wasn’t a machine where you could work on pass protection,” Krause says. “Golfers can go to a driving range, swimmers can go to the pool, but where does the offensive lineman go to improve his craft? He has to be able to move and strike; a lot of high-focus contact and body positions are required to play that position right.”
To help players work on these skills, Krause and other Rae Crowther employees worked closely with Bill Callahan, who was the Oakland Raiders line coach at the time and is now head coach of Nebraska.
What they came up with is the BC Cruncher, a machine on which spring-loaded pads are placed in a patented “protection arc.” Each pad may be latched in a spring-loaded retracted position and the dummies can each be released to spring to a forward leaning position that simulates an oncoming opponent, just dying to kill your quarterback. The player has to punch the pads hard enough to push them back into a locked position. Rae Crowther is one of just a few companies in the country that make these kinds of products, and they sell to both the NFL and college football teams.
Gravity Simulating Machine
When Luc Pham was in 10th grade, his teacher gave his class an assignment to come up with their own unique inventions. So what did Pham conjure up? The ultimate beer bong? A remote control for your remote control? Nope. Unlike say, the average debauched Creative Loafing writer, Pham had more noble aspirations. His invention was the Gravity Simulating Machine (GSM), a unique exercise apparatus consisting of a full-body suit embedded with magnets and an electromagnetic platform.
“At the time I was obsessed with working out,” says Pham, now a 20-year-old senior at UNC-Charlotte majoring in computer and electrical engineering. “I wanted to create a way to build muscle faster, and I thought why not workout in a higher gravitational field? People are able to move much faster on the moon because the gravity is only 1/6th of the earth. If we were to move to the moon, we would be able to jump much higher and move much faster, and generally perform physical tasks with much greater proficiency than if we had lived on the moon our entire lives.” Or, for that matter, the earth.
The GSM design calls for the suit to be made of cotton and embedded with magnets. The exerciser wears the full-body suit while standing over an electromagnetic platform. This way, even the mildest bit of physical exertion is turned into a super-charged workout. The electromagnet is connected to either a variable current power source or special software that enables the user to vary the strength of the magnetic field, depending on the person’s weight or desired level of intensity.
So you think this sound a little wacky? Well, think again. Pham’s patent application was granted last April. He has built and tested a small-scale version of the GSM, but estimates it would cost approximately $25,000 to build a full-scale version. He hopes to get the funding from NASA in order to develop a full-size prototype. In the meantime, he’s working on other patents, most having to do with the cell phone market.
Double Duty Toothbrush
The earliest version of the toothbrush used bristles from the necks of pigs. Companies began to mass-produce toothbrushes in the US around 1885, although most Americans didn’t brush their teeth regularly until soldiers brought the Army’s enforced habit back home from World War II. The electrical toothbrush was first marketed in the United States in 1960 by Squibb, and a year later General Electric introduced a rechargeable cordless toothbrush. Over the years, designers have continued to fine-tune toothbrushes, marketing multileveled bristles and uniquely angled handles designed to clean all those hard to reach spots. Now, a Charlotte dentist has come up with the “OnGuard Toothbrush,” a novel gizmo in which the brush is designed to clean both the upper and lower teeth simultaneously.
Dr. Fay Culbreth, who’s been a practicing orthodontist in Charlotte for over 30 years, came up with the idea after a day of seeing a number of patients all of whom “were having trouble getting their teeth clean.”
Culbreth figured the key to better oral hygiene was to make an instrument that would help people brush their teeth and massage their gums quicker and more effectively. He came up with a toothbrush in which the bristles are arranged in a cross shape, so that when the toothbrush is moved back and forth, (as opposed to up and down) it cleans both the upper and lower teeth at the same time. He applied for a patent in November 2000, and about a year later it was granted. He hopes to have them in local Harris Teeter stores in the next month or so.
“Brushing properly takes a certain amount of dexterity,” says Culbreth. “Most toothbrushes are getting more narrow. The OnGuard design is unique. There’s never been another toothbrush like it.”
So, you think you’ve got the next great invention and want to apply for a patent? Then check out the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s “How To” page: (www.uspto.gov/web/patents/howtopat.htm). Be prepared to go through a lot of red tape (patent approval — if it’s granted at all — can take over a year) and shell out some cash. Patent attorney fees can range in the $1000s.
Contact Sam Boykin at sam.boykin@cln.com or 704-944-3623.
This article appears in Mar 31 – Apr 6, 2004.
