Bookmark and Share
Blog

National Inventors Hall of Fame

Monday, March 29, 2010 8:25 am

In Northeast Ohio at the intersection of Interstates 76 and 77 is Akron, the Rubber Capital of the World. Akron is also the home of The National Inventors Hall of Fame (www.invent.org). The Hall of Fame began in 1973 and moved to its present Akron home in 1995. America’s greatest inventors are enshrined there amidst a science, discovery and museum complex called Inventure Place.

Travelers to the Inventors Hall of Fame may be interested in knowing that 40 minutes due north on Interstate 77 is The Rock And Roll Hall of Fame on the shores of Lake Erie in Cleveland. About 30 minutes due south down I77 is the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton. The entire area from Cleveland down to Canton is the home of many well-known businesses: Goodyear, Hoover, Maytag, Firestone, Goodrich, Babcock & Wilcox, Diebold, Progressive Insurance, Sherwin & Williams, Eaton Corp. and many more. Bordered by Detroit, a couple hours northwest, and Pittsburgh, a couple hours southeast, the corridor including Cleveland-Akron-Canton is an important manufacturing, technological and educational sector for the United States.

The stated goal of the National Inventors Hall of Fame is to honor “the women and men responsible for the great technological advances that make human, social and economic progress possible. Each year, the Selection Committee of the National Inventors Hall of Fame Foundation selects inventors for induction.” Although induction ceremonies are usually in May, the 2010 Hall of Fame class of inventors will be honored on March 31.

The Hall of Fame sponsors an outreach program called InventNOW (www.inventnow.org) with the United States Patent and Trademark Office to foster inventing creativity in children ages 8 through11. The slogan for the program is: “Anything’s Possible. Keep Thinking.” Camp Invention is another program which is a week long summer day camp for kids in grades 1 through 6. These invention camps travel out to sponsoring schools. Starting in 1990, InventNow sponsors an annual contest called the Collegiate Inventors Competition with cash prizes. The competition has “recognized, rewarded, and encouraged hundreds of students to share their inventive ideas with the world.”

With any discussion of the National Inventors Hall of Fame, there is one question: Why Akron Ohio? The answer is that the citizens of Akron wanted the honor of housing the Hall of Fame on the campus of Akron University as a way of remembering Thomas Edison, generally recognized as America’s greatest inventor, who was born nearby in a small town between Akron and Cleveland.

Previous Posts: