It's in!  This week we installed the window that is a tribute to Jerome Lemelson in the Metuchen Public Library.  The window commemorates 8 of his inventions-- the flexible track & car that drives on it, the ice skate blade, the toy train, tape cartridge, the "wheeled action toy," the "marking dart" game, and the flying model airplane.    

These are fun, visual friendly inventions that anyone can recognize; they seem almost child-like.  What you might not notice unless you look at the U.S. patent and Trademark office website (which is fascinating by the way and I spent many hours on it!) is every application was submitted with detailed text about the invention and pictures of it, often with close up drawings, mutiple angles and all parts numbered and labeled.  That is what I alluded to in the sketchbook-- to me, it looks like a simple toy.  But Lemelson wrote, "The mechanism 18 employed to cause the figure F to jump up and down within the volume 12 as the toy 10 is pushed, is disposed within a bore 11b provided on which the figure F rests is connected to an actuator 22 which depends downwardly therefrom..."

When people refer to Metuchen as the "Brainy Boro," Lemelson is one of the main contributors to that.  Now with the library grant, many future generations will have the chance to improve their thinking skills.Thanks, Lemelson Foundation!