CR5 Issue 175 January 2020

Our eccentric inventors: are
they having the last laugh?
They might have been created
the best part of a century ago,
but William Heath Robinson’s
delightfully oddball cartoons
seem to have a special
resonance for us today,
in an age obsessed with
technology.
Born in 1872, the famous
British illustrator became
a household name with his
tongue-in-cheek drawings
of imaginary, labour-saving
contraptions assembled from
old bicycle wheels, bits of
wood, lengths of piping and
lots and lots of string. Take
his wonderful illustration
of a butler spooning peas
into a heating device (which
occupies most of the space on
his employer’s dining table).
As the butler adds the peas,
his employer turns a handle
that transports them along a
complicated structure, using
pulleys and a conveyor belt,
until they reach his mouth.
Another much-loved cartoon
is The Wart Chair, where an
elderly man sits perched on a
stool, ready to pluck off the
wart growing on the top of his
bald head with the help of a
mirror on a stand, a large hook
and a lever.
Heath Robinson used gentle
humour to celebrate the kind
of well-intentioned amateur
inventor who typically spends
hours tinkering with various
odds and ends, dreaming
of the commercial success
that will eventually make his
or her fortune. Times may
have changed, but thankfully
we still have inventors who
are happy to keep plodding
away in the hope of a big
breakthrough – even if some
of their ideas are almost as
wacky as those featured in
Heath Robinson’s drawings.
“Like everything else in
life, it takes a lot of hard
work and perseverance to
succeed,” says Stephen Key,
an American inventor and
expert on product licensing.
In a recent blog entitled “The
Reality of Being an Inventor”,
Stephen warns: “You will
fail over and over again,”
adding “That’s perfectly OK.
Just keep moving in the right
direction and learn from all
your failures.” Here are two
British inventors who have
been willing to risk failure
(and ignore ridicule) in order
to follow their chosen paths.
John Ward and the window
cleaners’ friend
Eccentric inventor John Ward
is known for inventions such
as the musical frying pan, the
revolving teaspoon and the
portable bra warmer. “I’m
a self-taught engineer, just
picking things up along the
way,” he told his local paper,
Lincolnshire Life. Starting
out as a trainee painter and
decorator, John tried several
occupations before deciding
to build a career around his
barmy inventions.
Like the contraptions in Heath
Robinson’s cartoons, John
uses recycled materials to
create many of his inventions.
These include a ‘Helicopter
car’ built of reused Metro car
parts; the ‘Tri-bath’ – a boat
made of three old bathtubs
joined together on a frame,
and last but definitely not
least, the ‘Ladder-bicycle’:
a bike which can be ridden,
but when turned through
ninety degrees becomes a
handy stepladder for cleaning
windows.
Although John doesn’t take
his work too seriously, his
creative and practical skills
have caught the attention
of the media and the
commercial world: He was
invited to showcase his
inventions on TV in America,
Australia, Japan, New
Zealand and Russia as well
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