Elmer A. Sperry

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Elmer Ambrose Sperry founded the Sperry Gyroscope Company.

Sperry started out as an electric automobile manufacturer. At one point he drove John D. Rockefeller around Cleveland and was advised that he should look into gasoline power. He also visited the 1900 Exposition universelle and demonstrated an automobile there.[1]

Sperry developed a gyroscope for marine use in the 1900s and in 1909 began working on airplane gyroscope stabilization. He had been asked to work on aviation by Stanley Beach of Scientific American and gave a talk to the New York City Aero Club (= Aero Club of New York?) in fall 1908. Beach made some attempts to fly with a Sperry gyroscope but these were largely unsuccessful.[2]

Elmer and his son Lawrence Burst Sperry returned to the problem more seriously in 1912, making a more serious technical study of the problem, collaborating with Glenn Curtiss, and filing Patent US-1914-1368226.[3]

We have a case in which Elmer Ambrose Sperry, assigning patent rights to the Sperry Gyroscope Company, makes reference to one of his own patents, by patent number and by date granted, and which also makes reference to two other patent, not necessarily his own, or even directly pertaining to the company, referring to these via serial numbers and filing dates.[4] The patent in question, Patent US-1914-1360694, was filed well before the patents to which the document refers, though it was granted, and the document was printed, after, of course. This all highlights a retrospective analysis of the innovations involved, relative to any proprietary interests. The references via serial number never make our digital-era processes easier, of course. The inventors may or may not have been inventors subsequently involved with the Sperry Gyroscope Company.


Patents whose inventor or applicant is Elmer Ambrose Sperry or Elmer A. Sperry

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Names Elmer A. Sperry; Elmer Ambrose Sperry; Elmer Ambrose Sperry, Sr.
Birth date October 12, 1860
Death date June 16, 1930
Countries US
Locations New York
Occupations engineer, entrepreneur, founder
Tech areas Gyroscope, Stability, Automatic stability
Affiliations Sperry Gyroscope Company
Wikidata id Q761838