A Short History of the Vacuum Cleaner
It seems that the first real incarnation of the vacuum cleaner was a very large horse drawn machine. Its inventor Hubert Cecil Booth used it as the basis of a cleaning service, you hired them to come to your house or office and they parked the machine outside in the street and passed hoses in through the windows to suck up the dirt and dust. It seems it was effective enough to attract the attention of royalty and was hired to clean the carpets of Westminster Abbey in 1901 in preparation for the coronation of Edward the VII. Apparently it was also a very noisy contraption which led to complaints and even fines.
The first domestic vacuum cleaners were invariably hand powered utilising some sort of bellows arrangement. These normally needed two people to operate them, usually servants of the owner for as well as being cumbersome and difficult to operate these early cleaning machines were also expensive.
In 1905 the Walter Griffiths Manufacturing company of Birmingham England patented an “improved vacuum apparatus for removing dust from carpets”. It used a bellows arrangement to provide the suction but was manageable by one person. At the same time in San Francisco Chapman and skinner produced an electric vacuum cleaner which was portable rather than being installed the cellar or parked outside on a wagon. However due to it’s 18 inch fan and its weight of 92 pounds it was not a best seller.
In 1906 Jim Kirby invented a vacuum cleaner which used water for filtering out the dirt, being dissatisfied with having to dispose of the dirty water in 1907 he designed a machine which used centrifugal force and a cloth for filtering the dust.
Also in 1907 a janitor in an Ohio department store by the name of James Spangler built himself a machine using a broom handle, an old fan motor and a soap box with a pillow case for a dust bag. In 1908 he was granted a patent and formed the Electric suction Sweeper Company. One of his earliest customers was a cousin of his whose husband William H Hoover became the president of the Hoover Company, manufacturing Spangler’s machines. James Spangler was the company superintendent. Sales were slow to start with but after the introduction of a free 10 day home trial sales took off and all subsequent vacuum cleaners became known as “Hoovers”.
Since those early days there have been innumerable changes and improvements in the function and the style of domestic vacuum cleaners such as the “cyclone technology” of inventor James Dyson. However some of the best vacuum cleaners still adhere to the basic format of simple, compact, powerful, easily portable but highly effective cleaning machines. One of the best is made by the Numatics Company, you can read this detailed Henry Hoover Review