Today, a husband and wife engineer success. The University of Houston�s College of Engineering presents this series about the machines that make our civilization run, and the people whose ingenuity created them.
Brooms have been around since, well, since there�s been a need to get dirt off the floor. It�s quite likely our early human ancestors used tree branches to tidy up their caves. But it wasn�t until the nineteenth century that we witnessed the first major mechanical breakthrough in the science of sweeping — the carpet sweeper.
Brooms don�t work very well on carpets. Dirt gets trapped in the fibers. Brooms can�t move it. Carpet sweepers are designed to fix that. As they�re rolled back and forth, the motion of the wheels drives bristles which in turn agitate the dirt. A well designed carpet sweeper then flings the dirt into a receptacle. The most challenging part of making a good carpet sweeper is in the �fling and catch.�
Early mechanical sweepers can be traced to around 1811. But it wasn�t until 1876 that a truly successful design was introduced by Melville and Anna Bissell. The Bissells originally ran a business selling fine china, which arrived at their store packed in sawdust. Melville purchased a carpet sweeper, but wasn�t happy with it. So he made his own.
Anna thought it was terrific. So the two shop owners began making and selling them. They started small at first, with a few employees in an upstairs room. Together, the couple made sales calls to houseware stores near their home in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The Bissells were tenacious and they had a good product. Homemakers wanted them. Seven years after their humble beginning, the Bissells incorporated their business and built a modern, five story factory. With a focus on quality, the Bissell company was well on its way to dominating a growing market for carpet sweepers. And then tragedy struck.
Melville died of pneumonia in 1889. He was only 45. But while it was a personal tragedy for the family, business thrived. Anna picked up the pieces, and for more than thirty years led a successful worldwide expansion of the company. She eventually passed the reins to her son, Melville Bissell, Jr., who faced a new competitive challenge — the vacuum cleaner.
Vacuums have largely supplanted carpet sweepers, but not entirely. Carpet sweepers are light weight and energy efficient — great for a quick pick up when you don�t want to haul out the hoover. And they�re much quieter than vacuums. Restaurants continue to use them because they don�t disturb the customers.
Bissell remains the most popular brand of carpet sweeper to this day. And the company is still family owned and operated — the legacy of a husband and wife team with an idea for a better picker upper.
I�m Andy Boyd at the University of Houston, where we�re interested in the way inventive minds work.
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A History of Good Business Since 1876. From the Bissell Inc. Web site: www.bissell.com/Page_id/88/History.aspx. Accessed January 18, 2010.
Bissell, Inc. From the Funding Universe Web site: www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/BISSELL-Inc-Company-History.html. Accessed January 18, 2010.
The mechanical picture of the inside of a carpet sweeper is taken from the Web site of the U.S. Patent Office: uspto.gov. Accessed January 18, 2010. The remaining pictures are taken from the Web site of Bissell, Inc.: www.bissell.com. Accessed January 18, 2010.
The Engines of Our Ingenuity is
Copyright © 1988-2017 by John H.
Lienhard.
