Invention

Where does Snowboard come from?

In 1965 Sherman Poppen of Muskegon, Michigan, made the 'Snurfer' (snow + surfer), a binding-free board most consider the snowboard's direct ancestor.

Source: en.wikipedia.org ↗

More Inventions

Invention

Animated feature film

📍 Buenos Aires, Argentina

The first feature-length cartoon wasn't Snow White (1937) but El Apóstol, made in Buenos Aires in 1917 by Quirino Cristiani from 58,000 frames of cut-out animation. Its only copy was lost in a 1926 studio fire.

Invention

Aerosol spray can

📍 Oslo, Norway

Norwegian chemical engineer Erik Rotheim of Oslo applied for the first aerosol spray can patent in 1926. Americans later made spray cans famous with WWII 'bug bombs' that sprayed insecticide against malaria mosquitoes.

Invention

Cat's eye (road reflector)

📍 Halifax, England

Cat's eyes were invented by Percy Shaw of Halifax, England, who patented them in 1934 and named them after a cat's eyeshine. Wartime blackouts showed their value and helped spread them across British roads.

More from North America

Food

Maize (corn)

📍 Balsas River valley, Mexico

Corn was bred about 9,000 years ago from a wild grass called teosinte in Mexico's Balsas River valley. It was domesticated only once, then spread throughout the Americas.

Food

Buffalo wings

📍 Buffalo, New York, USA

Named after Buffalo, New York, not the animal. The Anchor Bar says co-owner Teressa Bellissimo first tossed fried wings in hot sauce there in 1964, though local chef John Young said he was frying wings in Buffalo from 1961.

Nature

Monterey pine

📍 Central coast of California, USA

Monterey pine grows wild only along a short stretch of California's central coast and on two Mexican islands. Yet it makes up about 90% of New Zealand's plantation forests.