Notwithstanding the the contents of the Homepage, the Yankees made the first electrical kettle in 1891 by the Chicago based Carpenter Electric Company. It took 12 minutes to heat the water because the heat element was in a seperate compartment and not immersed in water. It was displayed at the Great Chicago Fair of the 1890's.
In the USA patent after patent rolled out. The water boiling industry had begun. Patents were churned out covering heat element protection, construction and fitting of heating plates, temperature interuptors, limiters and controllers and patents which predate todays Mocca makers, Perculators and kettles.
Whilst the Brits looked Westwards over the last 100 years, the industry has failed to notice, that Eastwards resided many cultures who have been tea drinkers longer than any of us can imagine. Tea was consumed for ceremonial, medicinal and ritualistic reasons, apart from the normal enjoyment of course. Alas their prior art has predated our western inventions,...dangerously so.
SAMOVAR, CHINIK - RUSSIA-OLD SOVIET REPUBLICS
Whilst Samovars are documented during the 1700's, from Mongolia to the Urals, we are only concerened with that which was electrified. Tula was the City in Russia when finally the local industry churned out Electric Samovars. At first 5 pcs per day because everything was hand made. Once the design had turned more cylindrical, suiting mass production electric samovars were produced in Tula during 1956.
From the above pictures electric samovars caught up with the western designs, however embedded in the electrics are some very old ideas.
With electrification of theRussian home, arrived the electric chinik, initially in rather large vessels. Experts - as institute engineers were called, moved in to Patent new ideas. A Patent meant a little more salary but at heart it was the fame of the institution that was most important in those communist times.
Today if you dig into the archives of the old Soviet republics such as Maldovia, Ukraine etc you can find prior art in the form of Certificate of Inventions, or Patents as they were called. The old soviets were very familiar with Bimetals, flexible contacts and all the things that make todays Patents so important. As every great comedian has said "THERE ARE NO NEW JOKES ....IT IS THE TIMING THAT COUNTS"
Much evidence suggests a close relationship with the rise of the Sencha, a form of tea drinking that uses tea leaves instead of powdered tea. Sencha was introduced to Japan by the Chinese in the Middle 17th Century. Japans tea drinking led to the growth of a large water boiling industry.
Although most production was moved to China, Japan did produce electric teapots, airpots and kettles at home. If you log into the International Patent search engines, and input just one Japanese inventors name, you will be surprised to see all his inventions from now, back till the day he started. These engineers gave their lives to their Companies. Japanese Patents can now be seen filed worldwide and have been protecting their heat resistors, as they call them with two laterally spaced temperature limiters or thermostats for years. All these patents undermine the intellectual property on hand today held by various component suppliers.
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