Elisha Otis's Birthday
Next: August 3, 2027
The brake that let cities rise.
The story
Where it comes from
Elisha Graves Otis was born near Halifax, Vermont, on 3 August 1811, and this Story marks his birthday. He did not invent the lift, or elevator. He invented the safety brake that made it fit for people. In 1852, installing machinery at a bedstead factory in Yonkers, New York, he needed a hoist that would not crash if its rope broke. His answer was a stiff wagon spring that snapped open and caught toothed rails in the shaft the moment the rope went slack. In 1857 he installed the first safety lift for passengers, in a New York store.
How it's celebrated
There is no organised observance, but the next time you step into a lift, you are riding on his idea: without safe lifts, skyscrapers would not be practical. The store that had his first passenger lift, the Haughwout Building, still stands at Broadway and Broome Street in New York. Teachers can use the day for a simple question: how tall could a city grow if everyone had to take the stairs?
Did you know
- At the Crystal Palace exhibition in New York in 1854, Otis rode his platform high into the air and had the rope cut with an axe; it dropped only a few inches.
- He sold his first lift on 20 September 1853, and after his death in 1861 his sons Charles and Norton built the business into the Otis Elevator Company.
- Before lifts, he invented a railway safety brake and devices to speed up the making of four-poster beds.
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