JEROME LEMELSON: THE INVENTOR'S HERO
With More Than 500 Patents and Several Successful Products to His Credit, Jerry Lemelson was the Definition of a Successful Inventor. But His Relentless Defense of Inventors' Rights Made Him Much More Than That.
By Mike Foley
As a boy, Jerome (Jerry) Lemelson was a protector, ready and willing to take on the bullies who would pester his younger brothers. But his desire to defend others would not end after childhood. Lemelson, in fact, became the defender of independent inventors everywhere, launching a series of patent infringement court cases that pitted him against many of this country's largest and most powerful corporations. But Lemelson, who spent nearly 20 percent of his adult life in court, helped set legal precedents that protect the small product developer. And in spite of incessant legal battles throughout his life, he was a prolific inventor himself, holding more than 500 patents on products that have become an accepted part of life in the 21st century.
A native of Staten Island, New York, Lemelson began his love affair with innovation as a boy, when he created an illuminated tongue depressor for his father, a successful physician. An interest in aviation later led him to build gas model planes for competition and spurred him to earn bachelors and masters degrees in aeronautical engineering. In his early years, Lemelson worked with the Office of Naval Research in the development of pulse jet and rocket engines.
But his life an an inventor truly began in the 1950s, when he started work on automated industrial machines and robot technology, inventions that would find their way into business and manufacturing and keep him busy defending his patents for the next four decades. In the beginning, Lemelson prepared all patent paperwork himself, including the research and writing of applications that he submitted at the rate of one per month. During that time, he licensed his first product, a toy to the Ideal Toy Company. He also received his first taste of patent infringement when his patent for a cut-out face mask on the back of cereal boxes was utilized by a major cereal company. Although he took the case to court, Lemelson lost that first attempt to protect his patent rights.
Undeterred, he would later spend thousands of dollars and countless hours defending his patents and championing the rights of independent inventors. Along the way, he also licensed several successful products to companies like Sony Corporation and IBM, which resulted in millions of dollars and financial security for Lemelson and his family. His patents covered products that have become staples in American life, including the audio cassette drive mechanism (which became the Sony Walkman), word-processing technology, bar-code readers, and automated manufacturing systems, which were used in automobile production by companies such as Toyota, Mazda, Nissan and Honda.
A hero to inventors everywhere, Lemelson's work went far beyond the workshop and the courtroom. The millions he finally realized from his life's work also enabled him to create the Lemelson Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to invention and innovation. As part of the foundation's work, Lemelson created the Jerome and Dorothy Lemelson Center for the study of Invention and Innovation. Founded in 1995, the center is housed in the National Museum of American History at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. The center was created through Lemelson's $10 million grant to the Smithsonian and includes a variety of programs aimed at encouraging innovation in America. Among those are invention conferences, creative exhibits, oral and video presentations, a hands-on science center and educational events for middle school students and teachers.
In addition to the Lemelson Center, Jerry Lemelson also donated generously to innovative programs at Hampshire College (Amherst, MA), The National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance, and the University of Nevada, Reno. A grant to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) helped establish the Lemelson MIT Prize, a $500,000 lifetime achievement award celebrating great living American inventors. The award remains the world's largest single prize for inventors.
Lemelson remained actively involved in invention into his seventies and possessed an exceptional energy up to his death in 1997. It wasn't uncommon to find him on a jet ski, speeding across the water, taking life and creativity in huge gulps. That energy lives on through Lemelson's charitable gifts and the programs that continue to encourage innovation in America. Those gifts may indeed be Jerry Lemelson's greatest achievement, offering compassion and hope to the inventors who will follow him.
Those interested in contacting the Lemelson Center may do so by phone, email or postal mail.
Lemelson Center National Museum of American History, Room 1016 Smithsonian Institution Washington, D.C. 20560-0604 (202) 357-1593 http://www.si.edu/lemelson
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