The Remarkable Comeback of Pepsi-Cola

Pepsi-Cola, one of the world’s most recognized soft drink brands, has a history marked by struggle, innovation, and resilience. Founded in the late 19th century, the company faced major financial setbacks in its early decades. In 1923, Pepsi-Cola declared bankruptcy, burdened by debt and unable to compete with larger rivals. Its assets were sold to a North Carolina company, which soon resold the operation to a Wall Street broker for just $35,000 — a modest sum that reflected the brand’s uncertain future.

By 1931, only two Pepsi bottling plants remained operational, and the company once again fell into bankruptcy just five years later. However, a turning point came when Charles G. Guth, a successful candy manufacturer and president of Loft Incorporated, saw potential where others had failed. Loft was a chain of candy stores and soda fountains along the eastern seaboard. Guth viewed Pepsi-Cola as an opportunity to replace Coca-Cola, with whom Loft had an unsatisfactory business relationship, and to strengthen the appeal of his soda fountains. His instincts proved right — and Pepsi-Cola began a remarkable transformation.

Under Guth’s leadership, the Pepsi formula was modified. The new version eliminated pepsin as a major ingredient, giving the drink a smoother taste that appealed to a broader audience. By 1934, Pepsi had turned the corner, acquiring bottling operations throughout the United States and regaining its place in the national beverage market. An interesting twist in its history was that, for several years, all of Pepsi-Cola’s sales were managed from a building in Baltimore owned by Coca-Cola and even named after its president.

Within two years, Pepsi earned its new owner a profit of $1 million — an impressive feat during the Great Depression. By 1939, Pepsi’s net earnings had soared to over $5.5 million, cementing its comeback as one of the most successful corporate turnarounds in American history.

Today, PepsiCo is a global conglomerate with a diverse range of food and beverage products. Beyond its flagship cola, the company owns popular brands such as Gatorade, Tropicana, Quaker Oats, and Lay’s. Its acquisition of Quaker Foods brought Gatorade into the portfolio, making PepsiCo the leader in the sports drink market. From bankruptcy to billion-dollar success, Pepsi’s story remains a testament to vision, adaptability, and persistence in the face of adversity.
The Remarkable Comeback of Pepsi-Cola

The James Webb Space Telescope: A Journey from Concept to Cosmic Discovery

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is the result of over three decades of vision, engineering, and perseverance. Conceived in the late 1980s as the “Next Generation Space Telescope” (NGST), it was designed to succeed the Hubble Space Telescope by peering deeper into the universe through infrared light.

In 1989, astronomers first discussed the possibility of a large, cooled infrared observatory at a workshop hosted by the Space Telescope Science Institute. By 1996, NASA formally approved the NGST, setting ambitious goals of exploring the early universe. Preliminary design studies began in 1999, and in 2002 the project was renamed the James Webb Space Telescope in honor of NASA administrator James E. Webb, who championed scientific exploration during the Apollo era.

Construction officially began in 2003 under Northrop Grumman, but the project quickly became one of the most technically challenging in space history. Its segmented 6.5-meter mirror and five-layer sunshield required precision engineering never before attempted. Technical hurdles, cost overruns, and repeated schedule slips pushed the launch back multiple times. In 2011, budget concerns nearly led to its cancellation, but advocacy from the scientific community preserved the mission. By 2016, the telescope was built, though further delays—such as a torn sunshield in 2018 and COVID-19 disruptions in 2020—extended the wait.

Finally, on December 25, 2021, JWST launched flawlessly aboard an Ariane 5 rocket. Within weeks, it unfolded in space, completing one of the most complex spacecraft deployments ever attempted. By January 2022, it settled into orbit around the Sun-Earth L2 Lagrange point, 1.5 million kilometers from Earth.

In July 2022, NASA unveiled JWST’s first images, including the breathtaking “Webb’s First Deep Field,” which revealed thousands of galaxies in unprecedented detail. Since then, the telescope has observed the earliest galaxies formed after the Big Bang, probed the atmospheres of distant exoplanets for signs of habitability, and studied the birth of stars within dense cosmic clouds.

Thanks to its efficient launch, JWST may operate for two decades or more, far exceeding its original 10-year plan. Today, it continues to transform our understanding of the cosmos, offering humanity its clearest window yet into the origins of stars, galaxies, and potentially even life itself.
The James Webb Space Telescope: A Journey from Concept to Cosmic Discovery

The Golden Rule: The Rise of J.C. Penney

James Cash Penney began his illustrious retail journey by partnering with two other men to open a dry goods and clothing store in Kemmerer, Wyoming. Named "The Golden Rule," the store emphasized ethical business practices and customer service. By 1912, this single store had multiplied into 34 Golden Rule stores. The following year marked a significant transformation as the business was incorporated into J.C. Penney when James Cash Penney took majority ownership, though William McManus remained a partner. Despite the incorporation, the stores retained the Golden Rule name for another six years.

Between 1915 and 1917, the company's growth was phenomenal, expanding from 83 to 175 stores. This rapid expansion was fueled by an innovative strategy: store managers were incentivized to open new locations by allowing them to retain one quarter of the profits from their successful stores. This model not only encouraged growth but also attracted capable and entrepreneurial managers.

In 1917, Penney stepped down as company president, passing operational responsibilities to the new president, Earl Corder Sams, and assuming the role of chairman of the board. By this time, the chain boasted 177 stores with annual sales of approximately $14 million. Under Sams' leadership, the company continued its impressive growth trajectory, with sales reaching $210 million by 1929.

J.C. Penney's simple yet effective business model and commitment to customer service and ethical practices propelled it to become the second-largest retailer in the United States by 1970. Despite the challenges faced by many retailers in the digital age, the original store in Kemmerer, Wyoming, remains operational, serving as a testament to the enduring legacy of James Cash Penney’s vision and entrepreneurial spirit. This historical continuity highlights the foundational principles that have sustained the company's success for over a century.
The Golden Rule: The Rise of J.C. Penney

Chevron Corporation: A Legacy of Global Expansion and Innovation

Chevron Corporation, one of the world's largest integrated petroleum companies, has a significant global footprint and extensive involvement in the energy sector. From exploration and production to transportation, refining, retail marketing, and chemical manufacturing and sales, Chevron operates across the entire petroleum industry spectrum. It maintains operations in over ninety countries and employs approximately 28,000 people worldwide. The company transforms crude oil into various products, including motor gasoline, diesel and aviation fuels, lubricants, asphalt, and chemicals.

Chevron's roots trace back to 1879 when it began as the Pacific Coast Oil Company in Los Angeles. The company’s growth was exponential; in 1900, it was acquired by John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Trust. This acquisition marked the beginning of a series of strategic moves that would shape the company's future. In the 1920s and 1930s, Chevron ventured into international exploration, achieving significant discoveries in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. These early successes set the stage for future expansions.

In 1936, Chevron, in collaboration with Texaco, formed Caltex, a partnership that opened new markets across Asia, Africa, and Europe. This period marked the beginning of Chevron's transformation into a global powerhouse. The post-World War II era saw further expansion with major discoveries in Indonesia, Australia, the UK North Sea, and the Gulf of Mexico. Chevron's ability to continuously expand its reach and capabilities underscored its position as a leading player in the industry.

The year 1984 was pivotal for Chevron as it acquired Gulf Oil Corporation, nearly doubling its size in what was then the largest corporate merger in U.S. history. Concurrently, the company adopted the name Chevron, aligning its corporate identity with its well-known product brand. This strategic rebranding solidified its market presence and consumer recognition.

Chevron continued to forge significant partnerships and expand its influence. In 1993, it joined the Republic of Kazakhstan in forming Tengizchevroil, the largest joint venture between a Western company and a former Soviet Union member. This venture aimed to develop the Tengiz oil field, the largest discovery in thirty years, highlighting Chevron's commitment to innovative and large-scale projects.

By the end of the 20th century, Chevron's financial performance reflected its strategic successes. In 1999, the company reported a net income of $2.070 billion, a 55 percent increase from the previous year, with operating earnings rising to $2.3 billion from $1.9 billion in 1998. These figures underscored Chevron's robust growth and profitability, cementing its status as a leader in the global petroleum industry. Today, Chevron continues to innovate and expand, navigating the challenges of a dynamic energy landscape while contributing significantly to the global energy supply.
Chevron Corporation: A Legacy of Global Expansion and Innovation

Walter Brattain: Pioneer of the Point-Contact Transistor

Walter Houser Brattain (1902–1987) was a distinguished physicist, renowned for his collaboration with John Bardeen and William Shockley in inventing the point-contact transistor. This pivotal invention revolutionized electronics, earning them the 1956 Nobel Prize in Physics. Brattain's academic journey began at Whitman College, followed by the University of Oregon, and culminated with a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 1928.

Brattain joined Bell Telephone Laboratories in 1929 as a research physicist, dedicating nearly four decades to the institution before retiring in 1967. During the 1940s, his research interests at Bell Labs centered on the properties of semiconductors, particularly germanium and silicon. These materials were crucial in the development of early transistor technology.

In 1947, Brattain and Bardeen successfully developed the first functional point-contact transistor, marking a monumental leap in technology. Their invention, which they published in 1948, laid the groundwork for the modern electronics era, enabling the development of smaller, more efficient devices. This breakthrough facilitated advancements in various fields, including computing, telecommunications, and consumer electronics, shaping the digital age we live in today.

Brattain's contributions to science and technology continue to resonate, highlighting his pivotal role in the semiconductor revolution. His legacy is celebrated for the profound impact on modern electronics and the technological progress that followed.
Walter Brattain: Pioneer of the Point-Contact Transistor

The Evolution of Breakfast Cereal: A Nutritious Journey

The history of breakfast cereal in America is a tale of innovation, health consciousness, and marketing prowess that has left an indelible mark on the nation's breakfast habits. It all began during the tumultuous times of the American Civil War when Union soldiers found solace in hot breakfast cereals, particularly when logistical challenges left them marching or cut off from supply trains.

Cooks in the army ingeniously concocted "panada," a hot breakfast gruel affectionately dubbed 'bully soup,' using readily available ingredients like watery cornmeal and crumbled hardtack, staples of soldiers' rations. This early experimentation with portable, nutritious meals laid the groundwork for the breakfast cereal revolution to come.

In the late nineteenth century, spurred by the emerging health food movement, the Seventh-Day Adventist Church advocated for a vegetarian lifestyle. This movement highlighted the importance of dietary fiber, addressing widespread digestive disorders prevalent among Americans at the time.

One pivotal figure in this narrative is Dr. John Harvey Kellogg, a pioneer nutritionist associated with the Battle Creek Sanitarium in Michigan. Kellogg's fervent promotion of vegetarianism and his cereal experiments at the sanitarium propelled Battle Creek to the forefront of the breakfast cereal industry.

While Dr. James C. Jackson's granula laid the foundation for cold breakfast cereals in 1863, it was Kellogg's invention of corn flakes in 1902 that truly revolutionized the industry. Kellogg's initial offerings focused on pure, whole-grain products, setting the stage for the cornucopia of flaked, toasted, and prepared grains that followed.

Not to be outdone, Post Cereals entered the fray with Grape-Nuts in 1898, quickly becoming a commercial sensation. Post's savvy advertising tactics, including the inclusion of premiums and toys in cereal boxes, propelled the brand to meteoric success, netting a million dollars annually by 1900.

As competition intensified, cereal manufacturers began adding sugar and other additives to enhance flavor and appeal to children. This shift towards convenience and taste over pure healthfulness marked a turning point in the industry, as exemplified by Post's introduction of a new version of corn flakes in 1906.

Despite occasional criticisms of their nutritive value, breakfast cereals continued to soar in popularity throughout the twentieth century, with manufacturers responding by fortifying their products with essential nutrients. Unlike many other grain products, breakfast cereals experienced a steady increase in per capita consumption, solidifying their status as a breakfast staple in American households.

In conclusion, the history of breakfast cereal in America is a testament to the intersection of health consciousness, innovation, and marketing ingenuity. From humble beginnings on Civil War battlefields to billion-dollar industry giants, breakfast cereals have evolved to meet the changing tastes and nutritional needs of consumers, leaving an enduring legacy on breakfast tables across the nation.
The Evolution of Breakfast Cereal: A Nutritious Journey

Sidney Altman (May 1939 – April 2022) - Molecular biologist

Sidney Altman was born in Montreal, Canada, on May 7, 1939, the son of Jewish immigrant parents from Poland and Ukraine. His father had worked as a laborer on a collective farm in Ontario until he purchased and ran a small grocery store in Montreal.

While he was still in high school, Sid and a friend decided on a whim to write the American Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) at McGill.

Both friends applied to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston, and as luck would have it, Sid was accepted, but his friend was not. He earned his B.Sc. in 1960. He conducted his senior thesis research on electron decay with Lee Grodzins, and throughout his life, Sid credited Grodzins for inspiring him to consider science as a career.

He then spends eighteen months in graduate school at Columbia University in New York. He decided to enroll as a graduate student in biophysics at the University of Colorado, where he obtained his Ph.D. in molecular biology.

As a postdoctoral fellow with Matt Meselson at Harvard, Sid continued working on bacteriophage T4, characterizing a DNA endonuclease that acts in its replication and recombination.

After a year of research at Harvard, Altman had the great privilege of joining Cambridge. Altman made his initial discovery that eventually led to his Nobel Prize. At the end of his term in Cambridge, he was offered the post of assistant professor at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut which he accepted.

At Yale he progressed to full professor on 1980. In 1982, Thomas Cech, working at the University of Colorado in Boulder, had shown that RNA sometimes served as a biocatalyst—a role previously believed to belong exclusively to proteins.

He worked with ribonuclease-P (an enzyme composed of RNA and a protein), which catalyzes the processing of transfer RNA. Both the protein and RNA were thought to be necessary for the enzyme to work at the cellular level. Altman found that, in vitro, ribonuclease-P alone could splice the transfer RNA molecule at the correct site.

He revolutionized molecular biology by discovering the catalytic properties of RNA. The 1989 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was bestowed upon him and Thomas Cech, who had independently made a similar breakthrough.
Sidney Altman (May 1939 – April 2022) - Molecular biologist

Vacuum Foods Corporation

In 1942 the U.S. Army quartermaster offered a lucrative contract to whomever could figure out how to produce decent-tasting frozen orange juice. The U.S. Army decided to partner with National Research Corporation to create orange juice in a dehydrated form.

National Research Corporation was founded in 1940 by Richard Stetson Mores, a talented businessman with a strong scientific background. During World War II the Boston-based National Research Corporation developed high-vacuum evaporation processes for dehydrating penicillin, blood plasma, and streptomycin for use in the U.S. war effort.

In 1945, the U.S. Army orders 500,000 pounds of powdered orange juice. Florida Foods Corporation wins the contract. National Research Corporation organized Florida Foods Corporation headed by John M. (Jack) Fox. The new company quickly opened a pilot plant in Plymouth the heart of the Florida citrus belt.

The plan was to fulfill contract with army. However, the war ends before the product ships. Since the war was over, Fox shifted the company’s focus to the consumer market. In need of a brand name, Florida Foods hired an advertising agency based in Boston, a city whose rich history included the famous Minutemen. The agency thereby created the Minute Maid® brand, a name connoting convenience and ease of preparation.

They explored the possibility of marketing an “intermediate step” in the production process. Converting the powdered orange juice into a commercial product proved to be trickier than planned. The solution was an intermediate step - frozen orange juice concentrate which had a rich, fresh-squeezed taste.

The first concentrated orange juice brand—took place on April 15,1946, from the Plymouth plant. That same month the company changed its name to Vacuum Foods Corporation.

Vacuum Foods (which eventually becomes the Minute Maid Corporation) launches a national radio campaign featuring Bing Crosby, kicking off a 30-year promotional relationship between Vacuum Foods and Crosby.

Coke acquired Minute Maid in 1960 as its first brand outside of its core soft drink business. In Canada, it was in the 1950's that the Minute Maid Company made its first Canadian acquisition with Clinton Foods of Canada.
Vacuum Foods Corporation

Adler, Larry (1914 – 2001) – American harmonica player

Larry Adler or Lawrence Adler was born in Baltimore on 1914. Both his parents were recent immigrants from Russia. He generally considered to be responsible for the elevation of the mouth organ to concert status in the world of classical music.

He had worn a talent competition at the age of thirteen by playing a Beethoven minuet on what had hitherto been regarded as a musical toy. Soon after this victory and over the objections of his horrified parents, Adler headed to New York City to look for work in the motion picture industry, which at that time had not yet made the move to Hollywood.

Vaughan Williams, Malcolm Arnold, Darius Milhaud and Paul Hindemith have all written works for him and his reputation is worldwide.

He had appeared in motion pictures during the 1930s and 1940s and with concert orchestras. Adler himself has also written film scores including Genevieve (1954), for which he played in the sound track.

With other show-business personalities, he was blacklisted by the American entertainment industry after 1949 for his alleged left-wing sympathies. In that year, he refused to testify against the "Hollywood Ten."

In 1950 Adler and performer Paul Draper sued Hester McCullough, the wife of a "Time-Life" editor for libel for alleging he was a communist, but the jury was unable to reach a verdict.

Since then, he has lived for many years in England where he has created a second career for himself as a journalist and writer.

In 1994, he became the oldest artist ever to be awarded a gold disc for a million-selling album - appropriately of Gershwin melodies, accompanying entertainers from a different generation such as Elton John, Sting and Kate Bush.

Adler was an entertaining performer and showman--the concerts in support of The Glory of Gershwin also revealed that he was a competent pianist, when he opened each performance with Gershwin's Summertime, playing piano and harmonica simultaneously.

Adler died on August 6, 2001, in London’s St. Thomas’s Hospital at the age of 87.
Adler, Larry (1914 – 2001) – American harmonica player

Scotch whiskey in United States

In the early days of American whiskey making, many distillers were farmers who also produced and sold whiskey as a source of additional income.

In 1920 Prohibition begins in the United States of America. The federal government made an exemption for whisky prescribed by a doctor for medicinal purposes.

Scotch becomes popular in the United States during the Prohibition years, when it was smuggled into the country from Canada, the Caribbean and ships at sea. The earliest brands were dark, peaty, and strong. After the repeal of Prohibition, Scotland’s distillers began tailoring their products to the lighter American palate.

Scotch thrived in the underground bar world so much so, that by 1936, the United States had become Scotch whisky’s biggest market.

Scotch got under another boosts in popularity when American soldiers return from the World War having acquired a taste for it. A light bodied Scotch is not necessarily light colored since all Scotches have caramel added to ensure color uniformity, nor does light body mean low alcohol content. All scotches are bottled at a minimum of 80 proof; most are 86 proofs.

By the outbreak of the Second World War, Scotch was truly a premium product, and was one of three main quality British products used to pay the United States for war equipment.

The popularity of whiskey grew over the years and reached its heyday in the 1950s in the U.S., but soon the drink lost popularity and sales declined.

Currently, Scotland is the largest producer of whisky, but Canada, Ireland, and the United States are also important suppliers. Scotch whisky is a particular type of whisky, but “Scotch” denotes provenance; specifically, that this whisky has been distilled and matured in Scotland for at least three years.
Scotch whiskey in United States

IBM in history

IBM is a multinational PC technology and IT consulting organization headquartered in Armonk, New York, United States. In 1911 IBM was first incorporated in New York as the Computing-Tabulating-Recoding Company.

The company’s history, however, can be traced back to 1890, when the United States was receiving waves of immigrants. To meet the needs of measuring population the US Census Bureau sponsored a contest to find the most efficient means of tabulating census data.

The contest was won by German immigrant and Census Bureau statistician, Herman Hollerith. Hollerith formed the Punch Card Tabulating Machine Co. in 1896.

A merger of three 19th-century companies—the Punch Card Tabulating Machine Company, the International Time Recording Company and the Computing Scale Company of America—creates the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company (CTR) on June 16, 1911.

The new organization is based in New York City and has 1,300 employees. The company manufactured and sold products ranging from commercial scales and industrial time recorder to meat and cheese slicers, tabulators and punch cards.

In the beginning the company operated in New York City only. Within a short period of time, however, it quickly expanded its office and plants to other parts of New York State, Washington, DC, Ohio, Michigan and Toronto, Canada.

Thomas J. Watson Sr. joins CTR in 1914 and became the president of the company within eleven months. Over the next two decades Watson transforms the company into a growing leader of innovation and technology and a prototype for the newly emergent multinational corporation.

In 1914 Thomas J. Watson joined the company and became the president of the company within eleven months. Under his leadership the company continued to expand its products and services. At that time the company focused on producing large scales custom built tabulating solutions for businesses.

Within ten years Watson had expanded the company’s business operations to Europe, South America, Asia and Australia and in 1924 the company was renamed International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) to reflect the firm’s worldwide expansion. The company has operated under the IBM name in Canada since 1917.

IBM refers to the decades between 1939 and 1963 as the ‘Era of Innovation’. During this period the company’s product line expanded significantly.

In 1985 IBM introduced local area networks (LAN), which permitted PC users to exchange information and share printers and files within a building or complex. IBM established a foundation for network computing and numerous applications of PCs.

During the 1980s, IBM's significant investment in building a world class research organization produced four Nobel Prize winners in physics, achieved breakthroughs in mathematics, memory storage and telecommunications, and made great strides in expanding computing capabilities.

In 1993 Louis V. Gerstner, Jr, a former executive at American Express, Nabisco and McKinsey & Co., joined IBM as CEO. Gerstner emphasized the need to provide integrated solutions for the company’s customers. He also decided to keep company, together instead of splitting it into separate independent companies. Today IBM’s strength lies in its combined expertise in solutions, services, products and technologies.
IBM in history

Herbert Gasser – 1944 Nobel Prize Winner for Physiology or Medicine

Herbert Spencer Gasser (July 5, 1888 – May 11, 1963) was born in Platteville, Wisconsin, the son of Herman Gasser end Jane Elisabeth Griswold. His father, Herman, was an immigrant from the Tyrol, who, after working as a pharmacist, studied medicine and became a practicing physician. His mother, Jane Elizabeth Griswold Gasser, came from a family of early Connecticut settlers.

After attending the State Normal School he went on to the University of Wisconsin, where he graduated A.B. in 1910 and A.M. in 1911. At Wisconsin he took some medical school courses. Here he studied physiology under Dr. Erlanger, with whom he was later to have such a fruitful collaboration.

Gasser remained at the university as an assistant in biochemistry, meanwhile completing his preclinical subjects, and then was appointed an instructor in physiology.

He finished his medical course at Johns Hopkins, taking his M.D. in 1915 and working in his spare time with Dr W. H. Howell, the professor of physiology: then, after a year at the University of Wisconsin, he rejoined Dr Erlanger, who had gone to St Louis as head of the Department of Physiology at Washington University. From 1917 to 1919, during World War I, Gasser and Erlanger published 11 papers on traumatic shock.

In 1920, one of Gasser’s former classmates at Johns Hopkins, H. Sidney Newcomer, developed a three-stage amplifier that would amplify nerve impulses 100 000-fold. A year later, Gasser and Erlanger constructed a cathode-ray oscilloscope that could record the nerve impulse – a remarkable technical breakthrough. By 1922 Gasser and Erlanger used this instrument to study the details of nerve transmission.

In 1931 Dr. Gasser was appointed Professor of Physiology and Head of the Medical Department at Cornell University, New York City. From 1935 to 1953 he was Director of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, being later a member emeritus of the Institute.

Dr. Gasser was a co-author of the book Electrical Signs of Nervous Activity (1937). He has also published, alone or with his collaborators, many scientific papers on neurophysical topics, being appointed an Editor of The Journal of Experimental Medicine in 1936.

It was announced from Stockholm that after the interval of three years the Nobel Prizes were to be awarded again and that the prize for Medicine and Physiology for 1943 was to be given to Joseph Erlanger and Herbert Spencer Gasser ‘for their discoveries concerning the functional differentiations of particular nerve fibres’.
Herbert Gasser – 1944 Nobel Prize Winner for Physiology or Medicine

History of Ford Motor

Henry Ford (1863 – 1947) stands alone as a lone visionary personally responsible for the creation of the automobile industry in America.

A self-trained mechanic with a lifelong disdain of experts with university degrees, Ford built his firsts automobile in 1893, and a decade later he founded the Ford Motor Company.

Ford Motor Company was established in 1903 by Henry Ford and 11 business associates. At that time, the US was home of 87 other car companies. Before Ford, cars were luxury items, very expensive and only affordable by the wealthy. Ford’s genius was to recognize that with the right technology, cars can be made available to the public at an affordable price.

He intended to produce “the car for the great attitude,” and to do he had to harmonies mass production with mass consumption. Ford was not the first manufacturer to use interchangeable parts or to run an assembly line, but in his quest to produce an inexpensive and standardized product he perfected assembly line production techniques.

The result proved dramatic. In 1908, before he introduced the assembly line, Ford made 10,607 Model Ts – the “Tin Lizzie” – which he sold for $850 each. It was a powerful car with a possible speed of 45 mph. It could run 25 miles on a gallon of gasoline. It carried a 20-horsepower, side-valve four-cylinder engine and two-speed planetary transmission on a 100-inch wheelbase.

He shifted to an assembly line in 1913, and production quickly rose to 300,000 cars a year.

In 1916 he sold 730,041 Model Ts for $360 each, and in 1924 he produced two million of the cars retailing at $290 each. A total of fifteen million Model Ts rolled out of Ford plants before production ceased in 1927.

Prior to Ford, it took over twelve hours to assemble a car. By contrast his first assembly line turned out a model T every 93 minutes, and by 1927 Ford was making a Model T every 24 seconds.

In 1919, after a conflict between Henry Ford and the stockholders, several investors left and the company became wholly owned by the Ford family.

In 1922, Ford bought Lincoln Motor Company, named after Abraham Lincoln, for $8 million. Lincoln became the first "outsider" to join the Ford family of vehicle brands and initiated the company's entrance into the luxury market.

In the mid-1950s, Ford went public. In the same decade, Ford introduced the legendary Ford Thunderbird at Detroit’s first auto show after World War II. The Ford Motor Company became not only the world’s largest automobile manufacturer but the world’s largest industrial enterprise.
History of Ford Motor

University of Maryland School of Medicine

In December 1807, the Maryland General Assembly passed legislation establishing a medical college.

The University of Maryland School of Medicine is located on the Baltimore City Campus, and is the fifth oldest medical school in the United States. It was founded in 1807, when a group of professors obtained a state charter from the Maryland Legislature. This charter was needed because of the strong antivivisection activity in Baltimore. The first class graduated in 1810. University of Maryland School of Medicine is the first public medical school in the United States.

This school owes its origin to Dr. John B. Davidge, who in 1804 commenced a course of lectures in Baltimore on midwifery to a class of six students. In 1807 two eminent physicians, Dr. Cocke of Virginia, and Dr. Shaw of Maryland, united in the school and lectures were given on the different branches of medicine; in the same year a charter was granted, and the school became regularly organized by the style of the “College of Medicine of Maryland.”

In 1812, the state re-chartered the medical college as the University of Maryland, adding the areas of arts and sciences, law, and divinity. It thus became the first university in the nation to be founded with a medical school as its educational center.

The faculty at the University of Maryland actually started a hospital in 1823, so that their students might have an adequate exposure (This hospital was taken over by the medical school in 1830).

By the influence and zeal of its distinguished founder, and the labors of other eminent teachers, this institution has been rapidly rising into importance, and at the present time is one of the most respectable institutions in the country.
University of Maryland School of Medicine

Early Google history

Google, American search engine company was founded by two Ph.D. computer science students at Stanford University in California – Larry Page and Sergey Brin, who first met in 1995.

Larry Page was born in 1973 in Lansing was the son of university professor and a leader in the field of artificial intelligence, while his mother was a teacher of computer programming at the Michigan State University. Meanwhile, Sergey Brin was also born in 1973, in Moscow, Russia. Brin’s father was a mathematics professor at the University of Maryland and his mother was a research scientist at NASA's Goddard.

The research behind Google began in 1995. The first prototype was actually called BackRub. A couple of years later, they had a search engine that worked considerably better than the others available did at the time.

The first web search services were based on line directories, such as catalogs. This solution was proved inefficient, as the content available in the Internet became more complex and extensive. In this context, in 1997, Sergey Brin and Larry Page initiated the development of their own search engine algorithm and index, which later would be called PageRank.

Google algorithm computes a recursive score for pages, based on the weighted sum of the Page Ranks of the pages linking to them. PageRank is thought to correlate well with human concepts of importance.

Within the next few years, the prototype system had been converted into progressively improved versions, and these were substantially more effective than any other search engine then available.

Soon they were reporting that there were 10,000 searches per day at on their system. They named their successor search engine Google, in a whimsical analogy to the mathematical term googol, which is the immense large number 1 followed by 100 zeros.

Google was incorporated as a privately held company in 1998 and opened its door as a business entity in September 1998, operating out of modest facilities in a Menlo Park, California garage.

After receiving in 1999 investments of US$ 25 million from two venture capital firms, during 2000, Google becomes the largest search engine on the web, with the more than 1 million home unique URLs (universal resource locators).

Google also began to offer advertisements on search results pages in 2000 through the Google Ad Words program. By 2007, pay-per-click programs proved to be primary money makers for search engines.
Early Google history

Discovery of nylon at DuPont

Nylon is a polymer obtained by the condensation of diamines with bicarboxylic organic acids, or from omega-amino acids. In more specific terms, it is a polyamide.

The first nylon, nylon 6,6, was synthesized using diamines on February 28, 1935 by Wallace Hume Carothers at DuPont's research facility at the DuPont Experimental Station. It was called fiber 66 because each of its components had six carbon atoms. Diamines from C2 to C18 were synthesized and reacted with aliphatic and aromatic dicarboxylic acids to make polyamides, which were then melt spun and evaluated as fibers.

The process was technically complex, involving new raw materials, new fiber-forming techniques and unfamiliar materials of construction. The first nylon filament plant was built in 1939 at Seaford, Delaware, and nylon stockings went on sale nationally on May 15, 1940.

Early in 1940 the company announced plans to construct a second plant at Martinsville, Virginia; and in July 1948, it opened a third plant at Chattanooga, Tennessee.
Discovery of nylon at DuPont

History of Tobacco

Tobacco is derived from the leaves of the genus Nicotiana, a plant from the night-shade family, indigenous to North and South America. Tobacco is thought to have been cultivated in Americas since 6000 BC.

Americas Indigenous Americans began smoking and using tobacco enemas during circa 1 BCE. Archeological studies suggest the use of tobacco in around first century BC, when Maya people of Central America used tobacco leaves for smoking, in sacred and religious ceremonies. It then later started spreading as far as high up to the Mississippi Valley with the Maya community migrating from down south of America, between 470 and 630 AD.

The first Europeans to smoke were members of Columbus’ crew when they reached Cuba in 1492. In the same year, Christopher Columbus and his crew returned to Europe from the Americas with the first tobacco leaves and seeds ever seen on the continent. Within 150 years of Columbus’s finding “strange leaves” in the New World, tobacco was being used around the globe.

The British first obtained their tobacco by plundering Spanish ships en route back from America. Sir Francis Drake brought tobacco back from his circumnavigation of the globe in 1580 while some tobacco may have been brought back from the Caribbean in the 1560s. Sir Walter Raleigh brought tobacco back from his first Virginian expedition in 1586.

In the early 1500s Middle East Tobacco introduced when the Turks took it to Egypt.

In United Kingdom in 1833 the phosphorus friction matches introduced on a commercial scale, making smoking more convenient.

Manufactured cigarettes, made by a combination of hand and machine and later by machine alone, were first marketed in England in the 1850s. Their convenience, especially in the trenches in the First World War has resulted in them being the most popular nicotine delivery devices ever since.

In 1913 the Birth of the “modern” cigarette: RJ Reynolds introduced the Camel brand in USA.

Tobacco in many countries is sometimes adopted as a cash crop by the farmers and government treasuries (excise, taxes, etc.), and is also grown for local consumption.
History of Tobacco

Dr. Michael Ellis DeBakey: American heart surgeon

Dr. Michael Ellis DeBakey, 38th president of The American Association for Thoracic Surgery (AATS), was a heart surgeon. He served as an advisor to US presidents for more than 40 years. He died on July 11, 2008 at the age of 99.

DeBakey was the pioneer of bypass surgery and helped develop more than 70 surgical instruments in a career spanning 75 years. He was known as American heart surgeon, innovator, medical educator, and international medical statesman.

DeBakey was born September 7, 1908, in Lake Charles, Louisiana, the son of Lebanese immigrants. His mother and father were first-generation immigrants from Lebanon to the United States, settling down in Lake Charles, LA where DeBakey was born and raised.

His parents insisted he and his siblings read a new book from the library every week. He got interested in medicine while listening to physicians chat at his father's pharmacy.

When he was a boy, his mother taught the neighborhood girls knitting and stitching. DeBakey found it so interesting that he himself learned these trades. He would later use these skills to sew the first Dacron artificial blood vessel.

He received his bachelor's and medical degrees from Tulane University in New Orleans, where he was elected to Alpha Omega (A.O.A) honorary medical society.

At first, he was not sure about becoming a surgeon, but his mentor, Dr. Alton Ochsner, encouraged him to choose surgery. He completed his internship and residency in surgery at charity Hospital in New Orleans. After completing his surgical residency, he completed 2 years of surgical fellowship in Europe under the direction of Dr Rene Leriche at the University of Strasbourg and Dr Martin Kirschner at the University of Heidelberg.

He recalled in 1999 that the time he finished medical school in 1932, "there was virtually nothing you could do for heart disease. If a patient came in with a heart attack, it was up to God."

While still a medical student in 1932 he developed the pump which would be used 20 years later to keep blood moving in the body during open heart surgery. He initially used the roller pump for blood transfusions, drawing blood directly from a donor and transfusing into the recipient.

DeBakey has operated on more than 60 000 patients in Houston alone. His patients include princes and paupers, celebrities and unknowns the world over, all of whom receive the same high standards of excellence in healthcare.

Dr. DeBakey is also credited with developing the Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (MASH) units. He wrote many papers and began to consider the idea that it would be much more advantageous for the soldiers if they could be treated closer to the battlefield, rather than being shipped to a faraway hospital.

DeBakey was the chancellor emeritus of Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas and director of the Methodist DeBakey Heart and Vascular Center. He helped turn Baylor College from a provincial school into one of the nation’s great medical institutions.

In 1996, aged 87, he flew to Russia to examine President Boris Yeltsin and later oversaw his heart bypass surgery in Moscow and helped save his life. Yeltsin died of heart failure aged 76 last year.

Dr. DeBakey was a member of the most distinguished medical societies, having served as President of many of them. He was a founder and the first Editor of the Journal of Vascular Surgery. He was Editor of the Year Book of General Surgery for fourteen years.
Dr. Michael Ellis DeBakey: American heart surgeon

Condensed milk in history

Condensed dairy products are value-added milk products with extended shelf life. Fresh milk is clarified and standardized to a suitable level of fat, and it is then heat treated at 85–90 °C for several seconds. This heating process acts as a hurdle, which destroys the majority of microorganisms.

In England in 19th century, at that home the main industrialized nation of Europe not only fresh milk but likewise condensed milk was importance for urban consumer. As a relatively cheap milk product its consumption rapidly increased. It was, to a large extent used for feeding infants and young children.

Since ancient times, people have been aware that milk could only be kept fresh for a short while and that it was only available in the immediate vicinity of a cow. In the thirteenth century, Marco Polo reported that the Tatars were able to condense milk.

Nicolas Appert did his experiments on food preparation were begun in 1795 when France, under Napoleon, was fighting most of the other nations of Europe. Need for transportable food for the far-flung French armies had prompted the French government to offer a prize of 12,000 francs to anyone who could find a satisfactory method of preserving food.

Nicolas Appert condensed milk in France in 1820, and Gail Borden Jr. did the same in the United States in 1853, in reaction to the difficulty of storing fresh milk for more than a few hours.

While returning from a trip to England in 1851, Borden was devastated by the death of several of his children, apparently from poor quality milk obtained from shipboard cows. Borden was inspired by the vacuum pan he had seen being used by Shakers to condense fruit juice, and he was at last able to reduce milk without scorching or curdling it.

Gail Borden was the first, however to conceive and patent a process for condensing milk which proved practical and resulted in the development of a patent on the condensing process in 1856. He uses low pressure to make sweetened condensed milk. The first sweetened condensed milk in hermetically sealed cans was manufactured by Borden in the USA.

Although the claim of the patent granted Gall Borden was that of "producing concentrated sweet milk by evaporation in vacuo without the admixture of sugar or other foreign matter," Mr. Borden's commercial development was in the manufacture of sweetened condensed milk. Equipment design has greatly changed, but the principle of the vacuum evaporator developed by Gail Borden is still a foundation of the industry.

The business grew rapidly and spread to Europe by 1866 where a sweetened condensed milk factory was set up in Cham, Switzerland, by Charles A. Page, a US consul assigned to the country.

Until the early 1880s, unsweetened condensed milk was also produced and was sold open in the market due to the lack of knowledge and success of long-life preservation at that time.

The basic process for preservation of unsweetened condensed milk by heat sterilization was conceived by John B. Meyenberg in 1882, a Swiss citizen, and an employee of the Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Company.
Condensed milk in history

American Civil War (1861-65)

The Civil War was rooted in the civil societies of Northern and Southern states, based in uneven national modernization. Deracinated populations sought political and cultural solutions.

It was a social and military conflict between the United States of America in the North and the Confederate States of American in the South.

Both sides had advantages and weaknesses. The North had a greater population, more factories, supplies and more money than the South. The South had more experienced military leadership, better trained armies, and the advantage of fighting on familiar territory.

Combat began on 12 April 1861 at Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, and intensified as 4 more states joined the South. Although many Confederate and Unionist leaders believed the war would be short, it dragged on until 26 May 1865, when the last major Confederate army surrendered.
American Civil War (1861-65)