Made In New York Official Book Launch! These Inventors Weren't Dull!
Preparing for the unexpected is now expected.
My new book MADE IN NEW YORK, 25 Innovators Who Shaped Our World, debuts today! Of course, I’m very excited! And I’m honored to have the State University of New York as my publisher! (sunypress.edu/Books/M/Made-In-New-York) As the New York Times recently reported, all the cool books are being put out by university presses. If you’re seeking innovation inspiration, look no further.
MADE IN NEW YORK tells the story behind the inventions and innovations that were made in New York and went everywhere. The list of inventions developed in New York is a long one so I have chosen only the inventions that are relevant today. Sorry Robert Fulton. Like many New Yorkers, some came from elsewhere to find success while others were home-grown. Some became famous; others struggled for recognition. All were visionaries and risk-takers who were willing to put their lives on the line if necessary. From the first brassiere to the life-saving pace maker, and from a solar lantern to the first mass-produced camera, New York has been the seedbed of life-changing technologies that have altered how we live.
Here’s a few of the things that astonished me in writing this book:
—They didn’t call it the Manhattan Project for nothing. There were 10 top-secret sites around New York City that employed 5,000 people before someone realized that playing with uranium in the Big Apple was potentially disastrous so they decamped to Los Alamos. But not everyone who was mission-critical went. The woman called The Dragon Lady and the Queen of Nuclear Research stayed in New York City. Oppenheimer called her the “authority on beta decay.” She came up with the process that turned a simple bomb into an atomic bomb.
—The first submarine was built in New York and funded by Irish rebels who planned to use it to blow up British ships.
—George Eastman who founded Kodak was a real mommy’s boy.
—There’s a direct line that runs from the often mysterious inventor Nikola Tesla to Donald Trump.
—The guy who wrote the rule-book for baseball was a New Yorker and his name wasn’t Doubleday.
—The teddy bear was born in Brooklyn but the racial back story behind its creation that took place in Mississippi is mind-blowing in its intensity. Even Rough Rider Teddy Roosevelt was appalled as president.
—How an ex-captain of the French military wearing just his old uniform came to New York and basically designed America.
—Buffalo Forge made one of the worst decisions in business history when it decided to get out of the air conditioning business and let employee and inventor Willis Carrier go.
—Batman was born in the Bronx in a spot where the famous mystery writer Edgar Allen Poe once lived. Spooky. And Poe may have been murdered when he was “cooped up” by a gang who forced him to vote multiple times in a voting fraud scheme. You can see why voting machines became popular.
—The inventor of the roller coaster was a holy-roller who hoped his ride would clean up a depraved Coney Island scene.
—The inventor of the potato chip was America’s first celebrity chef. People flocked to his restaurant and he didn’t take reservations. The rich waited in line.
—The New York debutante who invented the brassiere later became famous for riding an elephant topless in Paris and was a central figure in a bizarre sex-triangle murder/suicide.
That’s not even the half of it.
Made In New York is now available in bookstores. Heartfelt thanks to everyone who pre-ordered I had quite the time writing it. I hope you have the same reading it. As you can see, it isn’t dull! The book is available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Target and other outlets, including the publisher: sunypress.edu/Books/M/Made-In-New-York. Also check out my new Facebook page (Frank Vizard, author, Made In New York) I’ll be adding supplementary photos and such as well as relevant news links to the book’s topics. sunypress.edu/Books/M/Made-In-New-York