Electric iron
By Jose Preciado and
Troy Randleston
The electric clothes iron was first invented
in France in 1880. On June 6, 1882, Henry
W. Seely of New York City received a
patent on one which proved impractical,
requiring too much reheating.
Info on electric iron
On June 6, 1882, Henry W. Seely of NYC patented the
electric iron, at the time it was called the electric
flatiron. Early electric irons used a carbon arc to
create heat, however, this was not a safe method. In
1892, hand irons using electrical resistance were
introduced by Crompton and Co. and the General
Electric Company. During the early 1950s electric
steam irons were introduced
Howe it felt in iron making room
Any inventor who had ever been near the room
where ironing was done knew it was a hot,
tiring job. Whatever the weather, the
housewife/laundress would work beside a hot
stove or hearth, with at least two irons,
probably three, moving them from stove to
ironing table and back again in a cycle of
heating, pressing and re-heating. Meanwhile
she must keep the irons spotlessly clean with
no trace of ash to soil the clean linen.
Can you tell the new or the old.
When the electric iron was made
The search for a foolproof "self-heating flat iron"
was under way by the mid-19th century. In 1852
a patent was issued in the US for a new, improved
charcoal-burning iron which would make
"practicable the permanent heating of smoothing
irons". By 1860 there were gas irons available in
several countries, with rubber tubing to connect
them to gas light fittings or to canisters, and then
there were numerous designs for irons with
internal burners and little piggyback tanks of
liquid fuel