Many of the things we use today have changed a lot since they were first invented. Did you know how these inventions started?
The ancient Egyptians were some of the first to use boats. Their boats were rudimentary. They used oars to move. They were made from papyrus reed tied together. By 3,000 BC their boats had evolved. They had started using wood to make boats.
More than 1,000 years later, the ancient Romans built huge ships. They were dramatically bigger than their ancient Egyptian predecessors. These ships could carry more than 1,000 people.
After that, the Vikings built longships with weapons on board. They traveled long distances in these boats. They even made it across the Atlantic Ocean to Greenland. That crossing would have taken 3 weeks. We still don't know how they did it.
In 1774, Claude de Joufroy invented the first steamboat. Back then, they were fast. They could travel at a speedy 5 miles per hour.
The ships we use today look almost nothing like the first ships made by the ancient Egyptians. But without their early inventions, who knows where we would be today.
Do you like to listen to music? Thomas Edison did. He invented the phonograph in 1877. On a phonograph, the music was played from a long cylinder.
In 1892, Emile Berliner put music on a record. For many years, people listened to music from records. The sound was not great. They were also very big.
Then, in 1963 the cassette tape was invented. After the cassette tape came the CD. It was much more portable than the record. Today, many people get their music from the computer or phone. They can listen to music everywhere they go.
Before the telephone was invented, people used telegraphs to send messages through clicks. These clicks are called Morse code. Some messages were very long.
But in 1876, Alexander Graham Bell invented the first telephone. Soon, there were phones for people to hold one piece to their ears and talk into a different piece.
In the 1930s, new telephones were invented. They had a rotary dial in the middle. People had to spin the numbers to dial a number.
Today, everyone uses cordless phones. Standing next to the phone while it remains in one place is a thing of the past. Over 3.6 billion people around the world use smartphones. That number is growing rapidly. Though modern phones have been heavily modified, we have Alexander Graham Bell's early invention to thank for connecting the world.
In the early days of computing, computers were large and slow. They would take up a full room. They were not for personal use.
Now, computers are millions of times more powerful than those early computers. That is even the case for the smartphone. In fact, Raspberry Pi launched a computer that is the size of a credit card. Compare that to a computer that was the size of a full room.
These inventions have all changed so much already. Just think what they will be like in the future. Maybe one day you’ll fly to school in your car plane.