A list of inventions from 1875 to 1900 serves as nothing less than an inventory of the toolbox for modern life: the telephone, the lightbulb, the phonograph, the fountain pen, the cash register, the dishwasher, the escalator, the vacuum cleaner, the modern bicycle, the internal combustion engine, the Kodak camera, the flashbulb, the X-ray machine, the radio, the tape recorder, the paper clip, the zipper, subways, electric power plants, and drinking straws. All these modern tools were invented in a burst of innovation unprecedented in human history.
