Abe Lincoln: Inventor
Abraham Lincoln applied for a patent this week (March 10) in 1849 for a device he invented that would lift boats over shoals and sandbars, and help them navigate shallow waters. He is the only president ever to have applied for, and received, a U.S. patent — Patent No. 6469.
Which actually explains a lot about the man. It explains why this ambitious politician — “the little engine that knows no rest,” as his law partner William Herndon called Lincoln’s ambition — would, in terms of his political advancement, commit the seemingly ruinous act of joining the Whig Party in a state, Illinois, whose residents overwhelmingly voted for candidates from the Democratic Party.
What appealed to Lincoln about the Whigs was their call for “internal improvements,” meaning they wanted government support for improving the roads, canals, rivers, ports and railroads, so that people, goods and services could move more easily between states, thereby boosting the national economy.
Lincoln shared that goal, in part because of personal experience. He had traveled Illinois’ roads as a lawyer on the state circuit, and he had traveled its rivers and canals as a young boatman for hire. It was that latter experience, especially his travels on the Sangamon River near Springfield, Ill., that resulted in his inventing a device designed to make it easier for steamboats to navigate shallow waters, or extricate themselves from obstacles such as sandbars.
Indeed, the idea for his “floatation” device came to Lincoln in 1848 while returning to Springfield from Washington, D.C., where he was serving his only term in Congress.
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Photo by National Archives.
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